


The Other Stark

by Mad_Hatter25



Category: Avengers
Genre: Canon divergent after that, Credit to confusinggemini612 for this idea, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, Natasha x reader are endgame, No Infinity War or Endgame, Reader’s got some baggage, Set after AOU, Smut, Tony really tries to get the hang of parenting, You are Tony’s daughter, ill add tags as story progresses, pyrokinesis, reader takes Wanda under her wing, reader was in the marines, some emotional hurt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-10
Updated: 2020-11-04
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:54:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 37
Words: 58,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25816870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mad_Hatter25/pseuds/Mad_Hatter25
Summary: Your mother passed away and left you nothing but a box of letters. Claiming they were from your father that you had never met. After you get home from your four year deployment in the Marines, you find the courage to finally sift through them. His name was Tony Stark. You looked him up, and decide it’s finally time to pay a visit to dear old Dad.
Relationships: Bucky/reader(platonic), Dad!Tony Stark x Daughter!Reader, Rhodey/reader(platonic), Sam Wilson/reader(platonic), Steve/reader(platonic), Wanda Maximoff/older sister!reader, natasha Romanoff/reader
Comments: 93
Kudos: 229





	1. Backstory

**Author's Note:**

> Credit for the idea to this story goes to confusinggemini612, thank you, dude!☺️
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not own Marvel or its characters, just the story
> 
> (y/n): your name  
> (e/c): eye color

When you were only sixteen years old your mother told you who your father was. She told you that he was famous, and known by many people. She’d loved him, and he had supposedly loved her, but the relationship wasn’t to last and they broke it off after five months.

But not before they’d made you. She had found out that she was pregnant with you a couple of weeks after they’d broken up. Deciding he was better off not knowing about it, she raised you on her own. When you’d asked why she didn’t tell him, she said that at the time it was just too awkward, they’d just broken up after all, and that he was a very busy man. 

She said that you had his same black hair, and that your voice held the same accent. But you’d gotten her (e/c) eyes. She had wanted you to take his surname, so she had named you (y/n) Stark. 

She only told you that much though, and no matter how much you’d beg, she wouldn’t tell you anymore. You didn’t even know his first name. For the longest time you had wanted to meet him, but when your mother got into a car accident, all thoughts of your estranged father were pushed from your mind.

You were seventeen years old when your mother died. After the accident, the doctors had told you that they didn’t hold a lot of hope that she’d survive. Her injuries were just too great. She didn’t even make it until morning.

Being the only family she had, that left you alone. After spending the last year of your childhood in a foster home with people who didn’t give a shit about you, you moved out as soon as you turned eighteen.

You and your mother hadn’t been wealthy by any means, so that meant you had to help out and get a job. Ever since you were fifteen, you’d had a pretty stable job working as a mechanic. You had taken some classes in high school, and had learned enough to at least apply for the job. The owner of the shop was incredibly nice, and through the three years you worked there he taught you everything he knew about fixing anything with an engine. He had been in the military too as a mechanic, and had had the opportunity to learn a ton of things about the trade that he later passed on to you.

So you worked. And saved up money where you could. When you moved out you’d had just enough money to buy a small one bed one bath apartment in the slums of the town you lived in. It wasn’t much, but it was enough for you. 

After you’d finished high school you joined the marines. You had always wanted to do more, to add something good to this world. So what better way than joining the military? You completed boot camp with little effort, having already been used to early mornings and pulling heavy weight because of your former job.

You learned many things about the world, and even gained a couple of friends. After you had finished your four year term, you decided that you’d try and learn even more. So you dedicated yourself to your body and mind. Learning several fighting styles and a couple of languages. You still lived in that tiny apartment, but for you, you didn’t need anymore than that. 

Another year went by, and you turned twenty-three. Because you were a military vet, you became quite the catch with the ladies, the main thing that drew them in being your muscles that they always seemed to want to touch. Going to bars and bringing a couple women home wasn’t unusual for you, as you’d done it a lot while you were in the military. But you never started something serious. You’d go to a bar, order a whiskey neat, and you’d drink until you needed another. You never went after anyone, you let them come to you. You’d always figured that maybe if you did it that way, and just let it happen, that you’d find the one. It was cheesy, but you still held out hope for that ‘one’ girl. It never happened. They’d come up to you, and you’d talk, but no real connection was made. Sometimes you’d end up taking a girl home and sometimes you went home by yourself, nothing ever went beyond that. 

You were a gentlewoman though. Didn’t believe in just kicking them out with the whole ‘wham, bam, thank you ma’am’ shit. If you didn’t feel a connection, which was often, you told them as kindly as you could. Some would get angry and leave immediately. But the ones that understood you’d invite to stay the morning. You made them breakfast, talked with them, wished them good luck in future endeavors, and then you’d drive them home.

When you got back to your own apartment, you’d stare at your closet. It was small, but the box it contained held something big. When your mother died, she had left you nothing but that box. You had only opened it once, and found a bunch of letters. When you saw who they were addressed to though you had immediately snapped the box shut again. 

For some reason today though, you decided you’d had enough of being scared to look through it. So you opened your closet, pulled the box off of the top shelf, and sat down on the floor at the foot of your bed. 

For a long while you just held it. Feeling the weight in your arms. You set it in front of you and pulled off the lid. Might as well just rip off the bandaid. 

You took out the first letter you saw, one that your mother had written, addressed to a man named Tony Stark. 

You read through it, finding out it was a simple love letter. 

You now realized why your mom left this to you, she was finally going to tell you about your father through these letters, because she could never tell you in person.

You read through another one, this time one that was written by him. Tony Stark, your father, had wrote back to her it seems. It was another love letter. And it seemed sincere. You wondered why they had decided to end it when it seems that they were both in love.

You dumped out the whole box and threw the cardboard somewhere off to the side. 

You heard your bed creak and you turned to look behind you. The girl you had taken home the other night had apparently just woken up. Trudy, you think her name was. She rubbed her eyes, and looked over the end of the bed at you.

“What are you doing?” She asked, her voice thick with sleep.

“Nothing important, don’t worry about it. Did you want some breakfast?”

“I thought you told me we didn’t have a connection, why would you make me breakfast?”

“Because while that is still true, I’m not some asshole who just kicks a girl out of the house after sex. We had a good time, so now I’m going to make you breakfast and drive you home, if you’re alright with that.”

“Oh. Well I left my car at the bar we were at. Could you just take me back there?”

“Of course. Now come on, after that workout from last night I know you must be hungry.” You smirked at her, and she blushed. 

You stood and went to the kitchen to fix her some eggs and toast. When you were done and she still hadn’t come out of the room, you made up the plates and brought them to her.

She was sitting where you had been, fully clothed now and reading one of the letters you’d opened.

You weren’t mad, but you weren’t exactly happy about that either. You didn’t know this girl, she shouldn’t be going through your personal shit. But you calmed yourself down.

“What’re you doing?” You asked, she jumped and dropped the letter, blushing hard at being caught. You smirked at her again.

“Um, oh God, I’m sorry! I swear I’m not normally a snoop, but they were just laying on the floor, a-and I just picked one up, God I’m sorry.”

“Relax, I’m not angry. Here.” You handed her her food and sat down beside her, eating your own breakfast and picking up the letter she had dropped.

“If I may ask, what are they?”

“Just some letters my mom wrote. Not a big deal. Eat, please, I promise it’s good.” You sighed.

She looked down at her food bashfully and ate the first bite. She moaned at your cooking.

“Oh my God, that’s the best I’ve ever had!”

“Weird, sounds a lot like what you said last night.” You teased her. She blushed an even deeper shade of red at that, if it was possible. Then she shyly looked up at you.

“Was... it good for you? Last night?” Oh this poor thing. She hadn’t been nearly this shy last night, but she’d also been almost as drunk as you were.

“Baby girl, you were great, I promise. You don’t gotta worry about that.” Truth be told, you’d been the giver, not the receiver last night. You’d given her at least three or four orgasms and she’d promptly fallen asleep afterward from exhaustion. But you weren’t going to embarrass her, so you told her you’d had a great night. And you had, you had plenty of fun just watching her come undone beneath you.

After she was done eating and so were you, you washed both of your plates and drove her back to her car. She’d thanked you for being so nice, and you thanked her for letting you drive her. 

You drove back home after you’d made sure she was safely in her car and that she had everything with her that she’d brought last night.

Sitting back down with the letters, you sighed heavily. You didn’t know if you should even read any more. You had decided a long time ago that you weren’t concerned about anything that had anything to do with your father. So you don’t know why you were currently opening another letter.

After sitting there for an hour, you had read through all of them. None of the letters had mentioned you, so you could only assume he had no idea you even existed. You took your searching a step further and looked up this Tony Stark person on your phone, hoping to find out a little more about him.

What you found was quite shocking. Not only was he rich and famous, which you’d always known, but he was also an Avenger. More specifically, Iron Man.

You remembered briefly seeing on the news the story about the infamous ‘battle of New York’ and the town called Sokovia that had been blown up in the sky. You knew who the Avengers were, and you knew who Iron Man was. You just never figured he was your father.

You don’t remember much about the programs you saw, hadn’t cared enough at the time to bother really paying attention to it. But now that you saw his face on your phone’s browser page, you remembered.

For some dumbass reason you can’t figure out, you really want to talk to him. Not because he’s rich or famous, not because he’s an Avenger, but because of your mom. It occurs to you that he probably doesn’t even know about what happened to her, he definitely doesn’t know about you. But you decide that you really wanna tell him. God knows why you’re driven all of a sudden after so many years later to meet him, but you are. You haven’t wanted that since you were seventeen, but you did now. 

You found out where the Avengers facility in upstate New York was located, and made arrangements. You lived two states away in Pennsylvania, and you really didn’t want to drive the four hours it would take to get there. But for the first time in six years, you just wanted to at least meet the guy. You just hoped he wasn’t an asshole.

You didn’t really bring much with you for the trip, not really expecting to stay long. Just meet him, tell him about mom and yourself, and answer questions if he had any. You didn’t have much of a plan beyond that. How could you plan properly for something like this anyway? 

You brought your phone, and filled a backpack with your phone charger, a change of clothes, and a combat knife one of your marine buddies had gotten you. Just in case. You grabbed your favorite hat that had the marines insignia on it, and put it on along with your favorite fitted, black leather jacket. 

Since you’d only been out of the military for a year, you hadn’t gotten a job. Mainly because you wanted to relax for a while after four years of serving. So you were glad that you didn’t have to make any arrangements in that area.

After making sure you had everything you thought you needed, you grabbed your keys and got into your old 1967 Chevy c/k10 series truck. Normally that kind of car was expensive, but considering you’d found this baby in a junkyard and the owner of said yard was stupid when it came to trucks, he’d sold it to you for only 700 dollars. It was missing a shit ton of stuff it needed to run, but you still had a good rapport with Sully, the guy who’d taught you everything you knew about mechanics. So you went to him, and he was able to hook you up. You insisted you would fix it up by yourself, since he had insisted on paying for a lot of the parts. Then you gave it a shiny black paint job, and immediately fell in love. 

“Hey there, darlin. Ready for a road trip?” You asked the car absentmindedly. Some people found it weird how much you loved your truck, but you mostly ignored them. You didn’t need that kind of negativity in your life.

You started her up and backed out of your parking space, beginning the long journey to see your father.


	2. Arrival

When you pulled up to the turn that would take you into the Avenger’s Facility driveway, you pulled your truck over to the side of the road. The last turn of your trip, and you were close to freaking out. 

Not necessarily freaking out though, more like over thinking it. You had never freaked out about anything in your entire life.

You thumped your head on your steering wheel and rested there, the weight of what you were about to do hitting you like a ton of bricks. 

“What the hell am I doing?” You sighed to no one in particular.

This was a big deal, some would say. It didn’t feel like a big deal, it just felt kind of awkward to you. You had never met this man and you didn’t even know if he’d moved on and had kids of his own. What if you were about to ruin his life by telling him he had a daughter? Would he even believe you were his? Would he be angry? Or worse, would he be really excited? 

Because if it turned out that he was really happy about it, what if he ended up wanting you to stay? It’s not like you had anything holding you down back where you lived, but you had made a life for yourself there. It was small, but you’d done it all on your own. 

You were definitely over thinking this whole thing. If you really wanted answers to all of these questions you were asking yourself, you should just go up there and find them yourself. 

You let out another deep sigh, and picked your head up from the wheel. Putting the gear in drive, you turned into the road that would be the start of the biggest change in your life. Only you didn’t know that yet.

You parked right in front of the huge compound, and steeled yourself before getting out.

You walked with an air of confidence into the front doors, and you were stopped by one of the receptionists.

“Uh, excuse me, ma’am? Do you have an appointment?” She asked.

“Actually yeah, but I should’ve made it like twenty-three years ago.” You smiled at her.

“Okay... can I get your name please?”

“Sure sweetheart, name’s (y/n) Stark.”

She blushed at the term of endearment.

“Um, did you say Stark?”

“Yes ma’am.”

She looked at you incredulously. “You can’t possibly mean-”

“Oh, but I do.” You cut her off.

She started to chuckle disbelievingly at you, but when she saw how serious you were, she snapped her mouth shut. 

She picked up a phone and dialed a number. 

“Hello sir? Um, there’s someone down here who says she has an appointment with you... yes sir I realize you have nothing scheduled for today, but-... yes sir.”

She hung up the phone and turned back to you.

“I’m sorry ma’am, he’s not taking any visitors right now. You’ll have to come back later.”

“Nah, that’s not gonna work for me. How ‘bout you just tell me what floor he’s on? I won’t tell him you told me, promise.”

“I’m really sorry but I can’t do that.”

“Well, you know, I didn’t want to do this. I’m not usually a mean person, but I’m gonna have to demand that I see him.” You smirked, keeping up your air of confidence.

“But I already told you he’s not taking visitors.”

“Babygirl, I’m getting up there one way or another. You can discreetly tell me what floor he’s on and I won’t mention it, or I can do something really drastic that I really don’t want to do.” You weren’t the type to threaten people, actually you tended to avoid confrontation as much as you could. But these were drastic times, plus you’d had five cups of coffee on the way here.

She looked really scared, and you felt bad. Really you did, but this was important. You’d apologize later. 

She handed you a key and a slip of paper that she’d written a number on.

“This is the key to the elevator, and that’s the floor he’s on.”

“Thanks babe. I really am sorry for being so mean, and I hope I haven’t scared you too badly.” You smiled genuinely at her, and left towards the elevators.

She looked very puzzled at what had just went on. 

You turned the key into its slot and pressed the button for the number she’d wrote you. The elevator started going up, and you leaned against the wall.

When the doors opened you started walking through the floor.

Hearing voices coming from a room up ahead, you followed it and stopped in the door frame with your hands in your jacket pockets.

There were four people in there, three men and one woman. The woman had long, brunette hair and was wearing dark jeans with a red leather jacket. One of the men had scruffy black hair and was wearing a purple button up, another man had blonde hair and was well-built, the last man had styled black hair and a trimmed beard, with dark eyes.

When they noticed you standing there, they all seemed to tense and they stopped talking.

The blonde man was the first to speak.

“Who are you?”

“Well, that question is a little hard to answer. I have an easier one, can anyone tell me where I might find Tony Stark?”

The man with the dark hair and the beard stepped forward.

“That would be me. Who wants to know?”

“Hm. You’re a little shorter than I’d thought you’d be.” You said instead of answering.

You felt an odd tickling sensation in your head, and you saw the woman behind him concentrating, her eyes red. You briefly remembered seeing something about her in the news, ‘Scarlet Witch’ is what you think they called her. You’re also pretty sure her powers include mind reading. You smirk at her.

“Honey, you don’t wanna dig too far into my mind. There’s a lot of dirty things in there that someone as young as you should not be sifting through.” 

She blushed prettily and her eyes dimmed to their natural color.

“Hey, excuse me! Still haven’t answered my question.” The man, your father, snapped in front of your face to bring your attention back to him.

“I’m sorry, what was your question?” You smirked at him.

“Who. Are. You.” He said, sounding frustrated. You at least know now where your temper comes from.

“Do you remember a woman by the name of Andrea Simpson?” You asked.

He looked shocked. “How do you know that name, exactly?” 

“She was my mom.” 

“I’m, sorry, was?” The blonde man asked.

“She died six years ago.” You answered.

Your father stared at you with a blank expression, fully taking in what you’d just told him. You watched as he started to connect the dots. Then he gaped at you.

“You mean to tell me, that Andrea Simpson, was your mother?” He asked.

“Yes.”

“How old are you?”

“Twenty-three.”

“So that would mean... that you’re... you’re my-” He hesitated.

“Yup. My name is (y/n) Stark, and you, are my father. And I gotta tell you, you were not the easiest to find.”


	3. Family Reunion

“I’m sorry. What?” Your father asked.

You rolled your eyes, honestly it hadn’t even taken you this long to come to grips with it when you first found out.

“You heard me right. But while I can tell this must be a shock to you, you should probably know how I found out. Don’t worry, I’ll give you the short version.” You smirked at him.

“Basically, mom would only tell me so much about you, never exceeding more than two or three details. But when she died, she left me a box full of love letters that you two had written to each other. Up til then, I hadn’t even known your name. But when I found out, I looked you up. Found out my dear old dad was an Avenger. Imagine my surprise. Honestly I don’t know what compelled me to make the four hour drive down here, probably figured you’d want to know what was up. So, here I am.”

“How do we know you’re not making this up? You could just be a really good spy for all we know.” The scruffy-haired guy asked.

“She’s the Scarlet Witch, right?” You pointed to the brunette.

“Yes. My name’s Wanda.” She answered.

“Alright, then finish your searching you were doing earlier. Look in my head or whatever and see that I’m telling you the truth.” 

“Wanda are you okay with doing this?” The blonde man asked, putting a hand on her shoulder. 

She nodded, and he let go as she walked up to you to stand face to face.

She placed her fingertips on either side of your temples, not quite touching you. She was shaking, poor thing was nervous.

“A-are you sure you’re alright with this? It’s very invasive.” She asked. 

“Go ahead, honey. You ain’t gonna hurt me.” You said reassuringly to her, you felt bad for her. She seemed so uncomfortable.

She then touched your temples with her fingers, and you were suddenly watching your life flash before your eyes. You saw every birthday, every hug, every good-night kiss from your mother. You had almost forgotten how pretty she was, or even what she looked like. 

The happy memories faded as Wanda continued her search. Now instead of love, you felt intense pain. You were watching her die all over again. You hadn’t cried once, not in the hospital, not when the monitor flat-lined, not even during the small funeral you’d put together for her. And not in any of the years that followed. 

Now she found what she needed to see, you poring over the letters and then looking Tony Stark up. 

She gave a little breath of surprise as she pulled away. You had to clear the lump that had formed in your throat at the memories of your mother, before you also opened your eyes. You hadn’t even known that you’d closed them. 

“She’s telling the truth. Tony, she’s your daughter.” She turned to the man in question, who’d gone a deathly shade of pale. His eyes were shining, and he took a deep breath to settle himself.

“So, she’s really gone, huh?” He asked you.

“Yeah.”

“Was she in any pain?”

“She was in a medically induced coma right up until she died, so I’d like to think she wasn’t.” 

“She never told me about- I mean she never even mentioned...”

“Me? Yeah, I know. Don’t worry, I don’t blame you for anything.” You said. 

“Yeah, yeah, good. That’s good. Were you raised okay? Your life gone well so far?” 

You were a little surprised at the question, but you answered anyway.

“Oh yeah, my life’s been great. Bought my own car, built it up from scratch, had my own job for a while before joining the marines.” You said as casually as you could manage. 

“Good. That’s great, kid.” 

You both just stared at each other for a long moment. Then he started to move closer to you, hesitantly. You did the same. You couldn’t believe it, were you actually about to hug your father? 

His hands were flexing at his sides, and he looked nervous. You were only a couple of inches apart by now. You started to raise your arms...

When you were suddenly tackled to the ground. A noise of surprise went around the room. Something was resting heavily on your back.

“Clint, what the hell!?” You heard Tony shout. Ah, so it was a man, whose name was apparently Clint.

“Receptionist from downstairs rang her silent alarm, then we saw this one reaching towards you. So I acted.” The man on top of you explained.

“Yeah, one little mistake you made there man.” You strained out from your position. 

Before he could ask what you meant, you had rolled and brought your feet up to kick him hard in his chest, throwing him off you before you climbed on top of him and pinned him down tightly.

“You weren’t pressing your full weight on me, a child could’ve escaped that pin.” You smirked down at him before standing and offering your hand.

He looked at your hand skeptically before looking around and reading the room. Deciding that you obviously weren’t the threat he thought you were, he accepted your hand and you pulled him up. 

“(Y/n) Stark, pleased to meet you. Well not really, considering you just tackled me and all.” You held out your hand with your signature smirk. He took it hesitantly and shook your hand.

“Wait, Stark? Like him Stark?” He asked, pointing at Tony.

“Yup, that’s the one.” You answered.

“You’re joking, right?”

“It’s a long story, one I will tell you once we give these two some privacy. Come on, birdbrain.” The blonde said, leading everybody except for you and your father out of the room.

Once everybody was gone, you looked back to your father again.

He opened his mouth and closed it again several times. Before he just walked briskly over to you and wrapped you up in a huge hug. 

A little noise of surprise escaped you, and you froze for a moment before hugging him back.

You both stayed like that for what felt like hours, but was probably only minutes.

You had to swallow another rock that had formed in your throat.

“I’m glad you’re here, kid.” Was all he said.

“Me too.” You cleared you throat. 

That was all either of you needed to say, you’d deal with the rest later. For now you were content to just hug your father, and push the rest of the world to the back of your mind.


	4. Meet and Greet

After a long time just standing and hugging, you start to feel a little antsy. You had ADHD, and it had never been your strong suit to just stand still for long periods of time. It was the main reason you knew three languages and at least five fighting styles. Once you were done with one thing you’d move on to the next.

You cleared your throat and gently pulled yourself from your father’s grip. 

“So. Um... how ‘bout a tour? Never seen the inside of a heroes home.” You said.

“Oh! Yeah, sure. Uh, we could start with the labs, if that’s alright with you.”

“You got a garage?”

“Yeah. You said you built your own car?” He asked as the two of you started walking, conversation starting to come easily.

“Truck, I built my own truck.” You corrected him.

“Oh, I’m so sorry. So, you said you built your own truck?” He enunciated the word ‘truck’ sarcastically.

“Yes, yes I did.” You snarked with a smug grin. He rolled his eyes.

“But yeah, bought her after I got my first job and my boss paid for the parts while I put ‘em all together.” You continued.

“So just a wild guess, your first job was a mechanic?” He asked.

“Yup. Glad to see you’re good at using context clues.”

“I know a slew of people that would heartily disagree with you.”

You laughed as he lead you into the elevator and pressed a button. The elevator started moving down, and you kept up the conversation.

“So, did you ever have any other kids?” It was very blunt, but that was your usual style. He huffed out a small laugh.

“While I was rather, promiscuous in my early years, no. I don’t believe I have any other kids out there. I do have a wife though, met her a couple years after your mother. Her name is Pepper.”

“That’s good, I’m glad you were able to move on. She nice?”

“Usually, as long as I don’t do something especially stupid. She actually runs Stark Industries.”

“Stark Industries?” You asked with a snark to your tone.

“What?”

“Oh nothing, just realizing how big my father’s ego is.”

“It’s not my fault I’m just that great.”

You snorted in laughter as the elevator doors opened into the garage.

Your mouth gaped open at the sheer beauties parked neatly in rows. You could’ve died and gone to heaven right then and there.

“Oh my God.” Was all you managed to get out.

“Yep, pretty impressive collection if I do say so myself.” 

You ran over to all the different makes and models, ogling at the paint and the wheels and the rims. 

“You have GOT to let me take one of these out for a joyride. At least let me take a peek under the hood at some point.”

“Woah, there. These cars are some of my prized possessions, you don’t just take them on some token ride-along, cars like these deserve the proper respect.”

“Come on, please! You can’t just show me beauties like this and tempt me so cruelly.”

“At a later time I might be convinced.”

“Ugh, whatever. Show me the rest of this place before I decide to stay in here forever.”

He chuckled and gestures for you to follow him back to the elevator.

He shows you the labs, then the training rooms, the hangar, and then he takes you up to the residential floors.

He takes you into a huge common room complete with a large kitchenette, a dining table, a pool table, and a lounge area in front of a giant flat-screen TV. Off to the right the room branches into a hallway with doors lined up and down it, you assume those must be the bedrooms.

You hear laughing and voices as you walk in, and it looks like the rest of the team is in there. Spread out into different groups all talking with each other. 

When you walk in with Tony, all conversation freezes as everybody in the room notices a newcomer’s presence.

You jam your hands back into your jacket pockets as they continue to stare at you. Before the silence stretches any longer, Tony clears his throat.

“Well I don’t know if Cap briefed you all already, but this is my daughter. Her name is (y/n), and I’m showing her around the compound.”

Everyone except for the people you saw when you first came looked at you with shock. The first one to come up to you was the brunette from earlier, Wanda, you remembered.

“Hi (y/n), how are you liking the compound so far?” She asked.

“Pretty sweet place, not gonna lie. I’m especially fond of the garage and the weight room.”

“You like lifting weights?”

“Yeah, before I joined the military I wasn’t too fond of them, but now I do it every day. Makes me feel refreshed.” You shrugged.

One of the men came up to you next, and stuck out his hand for you to shake. You did so with a firm grip and a smile.

“Name’s Bucky Barnes, nice to meet you ma’am. You said you were in the military?” He seemed intrigued.

“Yes sir, four years in the marines.”

“I was in the army myself. Along with my friend Steve, even though I warned him against it.” He smirked. 

The blonde man from earlier rolled his eyes, and you assumed he was Steve.

“If I may ask, why?”

He leaned in close to mock whisper at you. “Steve was not what you’d call well-built back then. He was rejected several times because of it.”

“How small was he?” 

“Well let’s just say a twig could lift more.” 

“Buck, really?” Steve asked, exasperated at his friend.

“Hey, it’s true! Just cause you’re bulked up now doesn’t mean you were any less skinny back then.”

“Back then? How long ago were you two there?” You asked. The whole team looked around at each other smirking, some were even holding in laughter. Apparently there was an inside joke of some sort.

A man came up behind Bucky and clapped him on the shoulder while smirking at you.

“Name’s Sam Wilson. If I may answer your question, out of all of us here, these two are the ‘grandpas’ of the group. When they drove up to base, they rode on dinosaurs.”

You raised your eyebrow at Bucky, and he rolled his eyes.

“Me and Steve both went under ice about 70 years ago and ever since we came back up, we haven’t heard the end of it.”

You smirked then, remembering the stories you’d read while searching on the Avengers.

“Oh yeah, now that you say it I do remember seeing stories about that. So how old are you both now?” 

“Oh, about 100.” Another man standing at the pool table smirked.

“I see, who are you?” You asked.

He gave a small wave from where he was leaning on a pool cue. “Anthony Rhodes, but everybody just calls me Rhodey.”

You nodded in aknowledgement. Tony then cleared his throat again.

“Excuse me, let’s stop crowding around the girl alright? Shoo, shoo! Go find a seat or something and we can finish intros there.”

Some of the team rolled their eyes, but nevertheless complied.

When everyone was sat around the lounge area, including you, Tony spoke up again.

“Okay, that’s better. Now, let’s go around the room, introduce yourselves, but keep it light. Don’t wanna be here all day.”

Most of the team either scoffed or rolled their eyes again. And you were starting to sense a common theme.

Steve spoke up first. “I’ll go first I guess. My name’s Steve Rogers, and like they said, I went under the ice for 70 years around World War Two. When I came back up it had been a difficult thing to adjust to, but I’ve mainly just tried to focus on helping the world be a better place to live.”

You nodded in respect. Next up beside him was Bucky.

“Well you already know my name, and my story’s pretty similar to his. Only when I came back up I was on the enemies side, with a group called Hydra. Steve saved me and brought me back to the good side.”

“You two seem wildly patriotic for some reason. Just a vibe I’m getting.” You said, and some of the team laughed at your observation.

Sam was next. 

“Like he said, you already know my name. I used to just be a detective until Cap over there convinced me to join up. Now I’m an Avenger and life is considerably crazier.”

You chuckled.

“Name’s Rhodey, like I said earlier. Mainly before I joined up I worked strictly with the government, helping Tony from time to time when he needed me to bail his ass out of whatever trouble he’d gotten into.” He nodded over to your father, who placed his hand over his heart.

“You have no idea how much I truly treasure you for your continued kindness.” He said sarcastically.

“Yeah, whatever. I mainly only did it because you would’ve died multiple times by now if I hadn’t.” Rhodey rolled his eyes.

“Oh please, I only called for help so you’d feel included.” 

Rhodey then flipped him the bird while the whole team laughed at the exchange, including you.

Wanda went next, telling you about how Clint had been the one to recruit her during the battle for Sokovia against Ultron.

“Ultron? I think I remember that. Weren’t you the one who built him?” You pointed at your father.

Steve looked over to him. “Yeah, Stark. Weren’t you the one who started all that?”

“I’ve no clue what you mean, spangles. Anyway, who’s next?” Your father snarked back, changing the subject quickly.

Next was Clint, who you’d learned had apparently been a SHIELD agent before he was an Avenger. Then there was the scruffy-haired guy from earlier, from whom you learned his name was Bruce Banner. He didn’t go to deep into his details, just that he used to be a doctor. Next to him was someone you hadn’t noticed before, but you weren’t sure how you’d missed him. He looked like a man, except there was a glowing yellow gem in the middle of his forehead. 

“I’m Vision. An Android brought to life by a computer program called JARVIS, a cradle, and the mind stone.”

“Um, I have questions about pretty much everything you just told me.” You stared at the Android.

“I understand. JARVIS was a computer program that used to run the last Avengers facility, his program was then transferred to me. The cradle is a medical device that could create human tissue in order to repair wounds, which was then reconfigured in order to make me. The mind stone, which you see in the center of my forehead, is one of six infinity stones. Its power was used to complete my form and make me stronger.” He explained.

“Oh. Well alright then.” You nodded with an impressed look on your face. You then turned to the last person that hadn’t been introduced. 

It was a woman with red hair, dazzling emerald eyes, and a toned as hell body. How in the holy hell had you not seen her before now? You don’t understand how you could’ve missed someone that was clearly sculpted perfectly by gods. She looked like the kind of girl you’d pick up in a bar times like, 12,000. Drop-dead gorgeous didn’t even begin to do her justice. 

She opened her mouth to speak and you had to snap yourself out of the daze she’d put you in.

“My name is Natasha Romanoff. Clint recruited me when he was still a SHIELD agent and I’ve stuck by his side ever since. Mainly to keep him out of trouble.” She smirked at said man, and your damn heart just, fucking stopped working. You cleared your throat to try and get rid of the sudden dryness. You put on your usual air of confidence and smirked at her while holding out your hand for her to shake.

“Nice to meet you. Tony did not mention anything about there being a beautiful woman such as yourself on the team.” Again it was insanely blunt, but that was your go to.

She looked momentarily shocked at your bluntness, but took your hand with a smirk of her own anyway. 

“How come none of you boys ever greeted me this way?” 

“You never been greeted like that?” You asked, your gaze still fixed on her intensely. You literally could not tear your eyes off her.

“Nope.” She shook her head at you.

“A damn shame.” She blushed a little under your stare, looking down at her lap.

“You know (y/n), until you got here I didn’t even know that Nat could blush.” Clint chuckled at her.

“Shut it, Barton. I can still kick your ass in training.” She shot back without missing a beat.

After that the room settled into comfortable conversation. Wanda had come over at some point to sit beside you and she was animatedly talking to you. Asking you about your life, what you liked to do, and your time in the marines. Steve, Bucky, Sam, and Rhodey all seemed particularly interested in that, and listened intently to you about that topic.

Wanda continued to chatter at you excitedly, probably just happy to finally talk to another girl. You found it adorable, and had taken to calling her kid or kiddo. She would blush whenever you did, but quickly recovered after and kept talking.

After about an hour of comfortable conversation, Steve addressed you.

“Hey (y/n), I meant to ask, but how long are you planning on staying here?” The whole team stopped their idle chatter at that, wanting to know your answer. 

You looked around the room nervously, rubbing your hands back and forth on your jeans.

“Uh, well, I hadn’t actually thought about it. I kinda figured I would just leave after I’d met you all and visited for a bit.”

Tony’s eyes dimmed a little at your answer, before Wanda spoke up.

“What? No! You can’t leave so soon! You just got here! At least stay the night, please?”

“You know we have a ton of spare rooms, (y/n), we wouldn’t mind it if you decided to stay the night.” Sam backed her up.

“Yeah, plus didn’t you say you drove from Pennsylvania? That’s like four hours away and we’d just be bad hosts if we made you drive all the way back there at night.” Bucky said.

You looked around at all of their imploring faces, including your father’s. He looked like he was begging the most. You sighed.

“You guys have pretty much backed me into a corner here.” You said.

“Does that mean you’ll stay?” Wanda bounced excitedly, like a personified puppy.

“Alright, I guess you talked me into it.” You giggled as she squealed and pulled you into a hug. You hugged her back, and when she let go Natasha put her hand on your arm. You turned to her.

“I’m glad you’re staying for a little, it’ll be nice to have another girl around.” She winked and got up to go to the kitchen.

As she walked further away your eyes ended up, wandering to a certain place. Watching as her hips swayed slightly as she walked.

Oh yeah, you definitely didn’t mind staying now. You were in trouble. Big time.


	5. Sleep Over

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: bad nightmare

After about another hour of talking to the team, you found that you were especially fond of Steve, Sam, Rhodey, and Bucky. Mainly just because you all had something in common. Since all of them were affiliated at some point with the military, you all had a lot to talk about. At some point you even started cracking jokes with them.

When you weren’t talking to them, you were dragged into a conversation with Wanda. For some reason you couldn’t fathom, you were like the most awesome person in the world to her. She babbled at you nonstop, asking you everything she could think of about your life. You humored her, answering her questions earnestly. Honestly you found her excitedness adorable.

She chattered on with you for the better part of an hour, until you looked at your watch and saw how late it was. It was almost midnight, and you usually went to sleep at 10p.m. You hadn’t even noticed how late it had gotten, too caught up with talking to everybody.

You looked to your father.

“Hey, Tony?”

“Yeah?”

“Y’all said there was a spare room for me right?” You asked.

“Yes, do you want me to show you where it is?”

“Please. I’m beat.”

Wanda looked almost sad to see you go. You turned to her.

“Hey, don’t worry kid, I’ll still be here in the morning. Not like you’ll miss me for long.” You said.

“Promise you’ll stay for breakfast?” She asked.

“Absolutely.” 

“Pinky swear.”

“Are you serious? What are we, six?” You teased. She just held out her pinky with a smug smile.

You rolled your eyes, but linked your pinky with hers anyway.

“Happy now?” You asked.

“Very.”

With that you turned back to your dad and he motioned for you to follow him.

He lead you down the hallway you’d seen earlier and stopped in front of the third door down on the right.

“Here you go, your room is next to Sam and Bucky, and Nat’s right across from you. So if you need anything during the night just go to them.” He said, opening your door for you to walk in.

“What about you?” You asked.

“Pardon?”

“Where do you sleep?”

“Oh. I don’t usually sleep at the facility, I have a place with Pepper that I stay at.” He answered.

“Ah, well goodnight.”

“Night, (y/n).”

He then leaned in and gave you a huge hug, and you reciprocated. When he let go he smiled, and stepped back to close your door.

You tugged off your shoes, jacket, and hat, and set them on the dresser by the door. Placing your shoes beside the bed, you jumped into it. 

The bed was insanely soft, almost like laying on a marshmallow. You pulled up the covers, and closed your eyes, thinking about everything that had happened today.

Before you knew it, you had drifted off.

Sleep never came easy for you. Sure you could get to sleep with no problem, but you could never seem to stay asleep. 

Often it was because of the nightmares you’d have of your mother. Her screams, her bloodied face, her crushed car. You say nightmares, but it was really just the one. It was always the same, and you always woke up before it ended. When you would wake up, you’d be covered in a cold sweat, breathing fast and hard, and always more tired than when you went to sleep.

Tonight was no different. 

You opened your eyes to find yourself in the middle of a highway. There were no cars except one, and you knew whose it was. The car itself was almost completely folded in half, totaled beyond repair. As you began to walk toward it, a woman started screaming. It was your mother. She was still in there. You tried to move toward her, but it was like gravity was weighing down on you, making it impossible to do anything. The more you tried to get to her, the more you would be pushed down. Until you were dragging yourself along the ground. The ground was hot, burning your hands and giving you blisters, but you had to get to her. You had to. When gravity had pushed you so much until you could do nothing but lay there, the door to her car opened. Your mother stepped out and started walking slowly toward you. The tarmac under you was burning through your clothes, melting your skin. You wanted to scream at the pain, but you couldn’t move. She appeared above you, her face black and blue and covered with blood. Your body was on fire now, the flames singeing your hair and charring the meat on your bones. As much as you wanted to scream and writhe, you stayed still. You stared at your mother, and it seemed like she needed to say something. Then she opened her mouth...

You launched yourself out of bed and scurried backward on the floor until your back hit a wall. Your shirt was wet all the way through with your own sweat, and you were hyperventilating, desperately trying to get enough air in. 

You focused on your breathing like you’d had to do so many nights before, until about twenty minutes later when you finally calmed down enough to at least peel yourself out of your sweaty shirt.

You threw it across the room, and buried your head in your hands.

“Fucking hell.” You panted.

You got up and quietly trudged to the closet. Hopefully there were some extra clothes in there.

Thankfully there were some white tank tops and grey workout leggings hanging up.

You dragged yourself out of your jeans and into some leggings, foregoing the shirt altogether. 

Then you quietly nudged open your bedroom door, and tiptoed to the elevator. 

Thankfully you remembered where you’d seen the training rooms, so you went there.

While you were waiting for the elevator to stop, you took the rubber band you always had around your wrist and tugged your hair up into a neat ponytail.

When the doors opened you made your way into one of the large rooms and over to a punching bag.

You realized you were still barefoot, wearing nothing except the leggings and your sports bra, but you didn’t care at the moment. You just wanted to stop thinking for a while.

You took your stance in front of the bag, and started throwing vicious punches at it.

You knew it wasn’t good to do this without hand wraps, but at this point you’d done this enough that you had thick callouses on your knuckles, so you barely felt it anyway. 

Ever since your mom died and the nightmares started, this had become a regular coping mechanism for you. 

Wake up, control your breathing, punch something until you aren’t thinking anymore. Over and over, night after night. At this point it was the only thing keeping you sane.

You didn’t know how long you’d been in there until you heard someone enter the room. You didn’t acknowledge their presence, just kept punching the bag.

“Rough night?”

You held the bag steady and turned to meet the person who’d entered.

It was Natasha.

“You don’t know the half of it.” You huffed.

“Oh, I don’t know, I’ve had my fair share. Wanna talk about it? I know we just met and all, but I know talking always helped me after a nightmare.”

“How’d you know I had a nightmare?”

“Well, first of all you’re up at three a.m., second of all, you have the look.”

“The look?” You asked.

“Yeah. The ‘I just had a nightmare’ look. Everyone’s got one, and it’s not hard to tell when they have it.”

“Ah, I see.”

“So do you wanna talk about it?” She asked.

You sighed and leaned your head on the bag in front of you. You stayed there for a while, a rogue tear escaping your closed eyelid. You roughly wiped it away and stood up straight with a deep inhale.

“No. It just gets worse when I think about it.” You turned back to her.

“So, in order to stop thinking about it, you punch things?”

“Yup. I know some say that that’s super unhealthy, but I don’t give a damn. It helps me.”

“Hey, no, I get it. Everybody’s got their own ways to cope.” She acquiesced.

You nodded and walked over to sit on a bench. She followed and sat next to you, leaving room between you if you needed it. You sighed deeply and closed your eyes. You don’t know what compelled you to say what you did next.

“It’s my mom.” You said. You were slightly shocked that you had spoken at all.

“Oh yeah, Steve told us that you said she’d died?”

“Yeah. Six years ago. You’d think I’d have moved on by then, huh?” You asked with a light chuckle.

“Not really. Everyone grieves in their own way, and at their own pace. Hell, sometimes I still have nightmares about my past.”

“Hm. The Black Widow. Badass assassin and amazing hero. Your past must be a story that’s actually worth hearing.” You smiled.

“I don’t know about that.”

“Well regardless, I’d love it if you told me someday.”

“Well I’d have to get to know you more first. Can’t go spilling all my secrets to the newbie.”

You scoffed and she laughed.

“So, when do you usually end up going back to sleep after a nightmare?” She asked after a minute.

“I don’t. Only tried that once, and I woke up in the middle of an alley beside my apartment. With a fire all around me. Still don’t know how I got there, and I’d like to not repeat that experience.”

“Woah. So you just stay up until morning punching a bag for hours on end?”

“Yup.”

“You ever tried taking pills?”

“Yeah, doctors say that my body burns through them too quickly though. I have an abnormally high metabolism, apparently.” You answered.

“Well that sucks.” She laughed, you chuckled with her.

“Yes it does.”

After another minute in silence, she speaks up again.

“You wanna spar with me?” She asked.

“I wouldn’t want to keep you up all night.”

“No it’s no problem, I’m too awake to go back to sleep now anyway.”

“Are you sure?”

“I wouldn’t be offering if I wasn’t.”

With that she stood up and offered her hand to you. You took it and she walked over to one of the mats. 

You both took your stances, and fought until the sun shone through the windows.

Several times while you were fighting you noticed her eyes drift down to your stomach, ogling at your abs. You smirked whenever she did, but your gaze had also wandered a couple of times to her toned legs. God she was hot.

You quickly found yourself regretting having to go back home. But you couldn’t just stay because of your father and a pretty girl... could you?

You were in SO much trouble.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For some reason it posted an unfinished version of this chapter, but don’t worry I deleted it and kept the finished version that you just read☺️


	6. Surprising Revelations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reader gets some disturbing news

You and Natasha had continued to spar well into the morning, only stopping for bathroom and water breaks. 

She was an extremely formidable fighter, matching you in combat very well. Of course, she knew more fighting styles than you did, but that didn’t stop you from being able to pin her several times. She seemed surprised when you had pinned her the first time, and told you that nobody had ever managed to beat her before you. 

“Seems like you’ve finally met your match darlin’.” You’d said with a shit-eating grin.

You enjoyed finally having someone to blow off steam with. All of your friends back home had stopped agreeing to spar with you because you kept winning. Said they were tired of going home with bruises. Bunch of wussies.

But when you were fighting with Natasha, it was different. Sure you were both sporting a few bruises, but not once had she complained. She just kept going, and going, and going. ‘Wonder if she has that same stamina in other places.’ You thought with a smirk.

You would’ve liked to spar with her all day, but eventually, at 8a.m., Sam came in and told you that Steve was starting breakfast. He also told you both to take showers because he could ‘smell you from upstairs’.

Natasha had scowled at him for that, but he just chuckled and made his way out of the training room. Once he was gone, she turned to you.

“Well, I guess we should probably get cleaned up a little. I’m probably gonna take a shower, or two.” She chuckled.

“I’d like to join you, but I have a feeling it’s too early in the relationship for that.” You joked. 

She blushed and her eyes darted down to your abs, now slick with sweat from fighting nonstop. You followed her gaze and smirked, then you nudged her.

“Hey, my eyes are up here, sweetheart.”

She snapped her head back up and blushed even harder at being caught. She cleared her throat.

“I, uh, I wasn’t... I’m just gonna head to my room now.” Her voice cracked on the last few words and she rushed past you.

You shook your head with a chuckle, before making the trip back to your own room.

After a thorough shower and changing into the clothes you’d brought, a simple t-shirt and jeans, you made your way into the common room where a beautiful smell slammed into your olfactory senses.

Eggs, cheese, bacon, gravy, buttered toast. God, this is what you pictured heaven smelling like.

You walked into the room and found the team all sitting down at the dining table. There was an open seat beside Rhodey and Wanda, and she waved you over.

You took the seat next to her and you noticed that Natasha was sitting across from you, chatting with Clint on her right.

She noticed you sit down and blushed while averting her gaze. Clint seemed to take notice of that and leaned down to whisper something in her ear. Her eyes went wide before she elbowed him in the side. You chuckled lightly at the scene before looking around the table to try and find your father.

“Are you looking for Tony?” Rhodey asked from beside you.

“Yeah, does he usually eat with you guys?”

“He’s usually one of the first people here, but I heard from Bruce that he’s been in his lab all night. So he’s probably just tinkering on one of his suits, nothing to worry about. He’ll probably be here in a minute or two.”

“Has he ever spent nights in his lab before?” You asked.

“Oh yeah, tons of times. It’s like his summer home.”

You chuckled and looked up as Steve started laying out the dishes of food on the table. The table had been set when you’d come down, plates and utensils in front of each chair.

You quickly filled your plate with the food, and dug in. You were always especially hungry in the mornings, but to be honest it was like that all day as well. You’d gone to doctors about it, because it had seemed weird to you that you were always so freaking hungry. That’s originally how you found out about your high metabolism. 

The doctors couldn’t explain it, but your body burned through food and medication faster than any normal person should. They’d run several tests to try and figure out why, but never came up with a reason. So you’d just written it off, and ate more. It wasn’t too big of a deal to you, didn’t affect your life too much. 

So you stopped worrying and whenever you ate you piled your plate. 

That was why you had five pieces of bacon, three slices of toast, and hearty helpings of both the eggs and the gravy. Once you were done with the first plate, (you waited for everybody to get seconds) you piled your plate again.

“Damn girl, it’s not a competition or anything.” Sam said from Natasha’s left side.

You swallowed your bite of food before answering.

“Not my fault. My metabolism is higher than the average, so I’m pretty much always hungry.” You explained.

You and him bickered back and forth on whether or not you were just hogging food, before your father finally walked in the room.

He looked rough, like he’d definitely had a long night. Once his eyes found yours he motioned you over. You excused yourself from the table and met with him in the kitchen, away from prying ears.

“(Y/n), there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you since yesterday, but I never found the right time.” He looked extremely nervous. And you were beginning to worry.

“What is it?” You asked.

“There’s really no right way to say this. Um, do you know what mutants are?”

“Uh, yeah. I’ve seen them plenty of times on the news. What does that have to do with whatever you have to tell me?”

“When I met your mother, and we started seeing each other on a regular basis, she told me something about herself that no one else in her life knew about.”

“What are you trying to say?”

“(Y/n), your mom... she, GOD why is this so hard?”

“Jesus, Tony just tell me.” You said.

“Your mother was a mutant.”

You blinked in shock, she had never mentioned this to you. Never even shown any traits that would prove it true.

“What are you talking about? I lived with her for sixteen years and I was never given any indication that she was a mutant. She was normal, completely normal.” You said.

“No, she showed me once. I guess she didn’t tell you anything because there was a lot of controversy surrounding mutants at the time, and she didn’t want to drag you into it.”

“If that is true, and she was a mutant, why are you telling me?”

“Because I had a friend keep tabs on you over the years. And I have reason to believe that she passed the mutant gene on to you.”

You froze as you processed what he’d just told you.

“I’m sorry. Let me back up, you had a friend keep tabs on me?” You said with barely checked anger. He kept his head down, avoiding your gaze.

“You knew about me this whole time? And never once, ever even tried to contact me? Even when my fucking mother died?” You asked, your voice steadily growing in volume. 

“What the actual fuck?! I had to go to her funeral, alone! Where the hell were you while that happened, huh?! Or after when I was barely scraping by on my own?” You shouted, catching the team’s attention now.

“And now after six fucking years of being alone, I decide to come up here to finally meet my dad, only to find out he’s been lying to me my entire life! Also, my mother was apparently a mutant, which she never fucking bothered to tell me! And now you’re saying I’m a mutant? That means my mother had to have known, which also means you did, and NEITHER OF YOU TOLD ME!” You were breathing hard, your chest heaving with anger and betrayal.

“My whole fucking life is a lie.” You finished with a whisper.

All of the team’s eyes were on you now, shocked at the outburst. He opened his mouth to try and explain but you just held your hand up and rushed out of the room.

You could hear them calling after you, but you didn’t stop. You kept running, foregoing the elevator and instead taking the stairs two at a time.

When you finally burst out of the front doors, you kept running. Across the expanse of the field, and into the wooded area beyond. 

You kept running until tears were making your vision blurry. Then you stopped when the forest opened into a clearing.

You just stood there, breathing heavily. Both from exhaustion and anger. 

How could she have kept this from you for your entire life? How could HE have? Your mother and your father both knew something huge about you that they’d kept from you.

The more you thought about it, the angrier you got. And the angrier you got, the hotter your body got, until you swore there was steam hissing off your skin.

Then you realized, that’s exactly what it was. There were actual flumes of steam rolling off of your skin.

You couldn’t bring yourself to care at the moment. 

Your whole life had been a lie. Your mother lied to you until the day she died. Your father continued to lie to you for years after. And that’s not even what you were mostly mad about.

What you were really irate about was that he’d left her all alone while she was dying in a fucking hospital. He didn’t bring himself out of his stupid tower once to try and help. Not while she was dying, not while you had to plan your own mother’s fucking funeral, and not when you had to spend the next six years alone. 

Not once had he reached out to help you, or her. He claimed to love her in his letters, and now you were even wondering if even THAT was a lie. 

How could you claim to love someone, but then leave them all alone to die? 

Your were hyperventilating now, your chest caving with the effort. Your fists were clenched so hard that you were bleeding, your short nails cutting into your palms. Your vision was tinged red, so you clenched your eyes shut, and the frustration just kept building unbearably in your throat. You wanted to scream, no, you NEEDED to scream. So you took the deepest breath you could manage.

And screamed as loud as you could. 

The sound echoed all around you, as your body seemed to relax at the release. Your hands flew open, and a sudden heat wave blew into your face before the air settled again.

You opened your eyes, and what you saw definitely wasn’t there before. 

The whole clearing around you was covered in flames. Clinging to the grass, blackening the ground. 

You looked down at your hands, and found they were enveloped by balls of fire. You panicked for a split second, before realizing that it didn’t even hurt. 

You marveled at the beauty of it, before you heard someone shout behind you. 

You couldn’t hear what they’d said, every noise was garbled and sounded like you were hearing it underwater. 

You turned to find the team on the edge of the clearing, and saw Wanda fly in the air towards you. 

You were so tired now. And couldn’t seem to keep your knees from buckling. The world had gone black before you even hit the ground.


	7. Worse Than a Hangover

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys I’m so sorry this is a day late I was just cleared to go back to work as a CNA and was on a 12 hour shift, I’m so tired😂
> 
> But rest assured that I will still keep up with regular updates, happy reading!😁😁

The first thing you noticed when you came to was how utterly exhausted you felt. You couldn’t even open your eyes, it was like someone had superglued them shut. 

After a few minutes of trying you were finally able to crack one open a little. Then the other, slowly. You blinked a couple of times to clear the grogginess from your head, and then moved on to trying to sit up. 

That proved pretty much impossible. You were never one to back down from a challenge, but this was horrible. Even just pushing your arms into position so that they could lift your body was fucking exhausting. But you continued until finally, after what felt like half an hour, you managed to push yourself until you were sitting on the edge of the bed.

You held your head in your hands, your elbows resting heavily on your knees. God, you were tired.

A few moments later you heard the door to the medbay open. At least you were pretty sure you were in the medbay. You hadn’t exactly had time to examine your surroundings, your primary focus having been on sitting up without passing out.

You lifted your head up to meet whoever had opened the door and found Natasha, Wanda, and Bruce.

“Oh thank God, you’re finally awake. You had me really worried there for a minute.” Bruce said as he walked over to your side, pressing a stethoscope to your chest.

“How long exactly was I out?” You asked. Taking a deep breath as directed by Bruce.

“Two days.” Wanda said.

“Well shit. That’s one hell of a power nap.” You chuckled.

“You may be laughing, but I was the one who had to carry your lifeless body back to the compound. And trust me, you are not light.” Wanda snarked. 

“Eh, that’s all muscle.”

“That’s what they all say.” 

“You wanna go, witch girl?”

“Bring it on, sparkle hands.” She stuck her tongue out at you, and you chuckled, before pausing at what she’d called you.

“Wait, where did ‘sparkle hands’ come from?” You asked.

They all looked at you warily, before Bruce placed his stethoscope back around his neck, and looked at you cautiously.

“(Y/n), do you remember at all what happened before you passed out?” He asked.

You thought for a moment.

“Um, I had a fight with Tony. Then I ran outside, through a forest, and into a clearing. I remember getting really mad, then seeing red, then... nothing.” You recounted what you could remember, which wasn’t much.

Bruce walked over to a table at the front of the room and grabbed a tablet, bringing it over to you and setting it on your lap.

“We have mini drones that Tony developed as extra security for the base, while they were surveying the area, one of the drones caught this.” He pressed a spot on the tablet, and a video link opened up. Then he pressed play.

What you saw for a few moments was just an overhead shot of a drone flying over the forest. Before it came upon the clearing that you were standing in in the video.

“Whenever a drone detects movement or abnormal heat signatures it stops and tracks it while sending a signal to FRIDAY, the facility’s AI. That way we know if a potential threat is approaching the base and we can get prepared ahead of time. This drone just happened to catch what happened to you in that clearing.”

You kept watching the video. At first you were just standing there, then you saw your hands open and fire immediately spewing out of them. Swathing the field in red. 

You played back the video again, thinking you must have seen it wrong, and there was no way that you had just witnessed yourself shoot actual fire from your hands.

But it was true, it was real. There it was in black and white. No matter how many times you rewound the footage.

“I don’t totally understand. How could this be possible? This has never happened to me before. Why would it just be starting now, when I’m 23? Why not sooner?” You asked. None of it made sense to you.

“Well, I think it may be because of your mutant gene. Tony explained to all of us what had happened after we brought you back, and told us how he thought your mother may have passed the mutant gene on to you. The gene acts in a variety of ways, almost always unpredictable. Some people show signs when they’re five, some when they hit puberty, and others when a huge emotional response is triggered. I think that’s what happened to you.”

“Okay. Your theory?” You asked.

“When your father revealed to you some rather disturbing news about your life, it affected you in a huge way. Causing a strong emotional response, anger, and consequentially leading to an outburst. I think that the extensive chemical release of adrenaline and cortisol triggered the activation of your mutant gene.”

“The chemical release of huh?”

“Adrenaline and cortisol. Hormones produced by the brain that make you feel angry.” He explained.

“Oh.” You said dumbly.

Honestly, what else were you supposed to say? This information was hitting you like a truck. No, a train. Maybe a tank. Whatever, it was hitting you hard and you didn’t know what to do about it.

“How do you feel right now?” Natasha asked.

“Emotionally or physically? Either way, the answer’s not gonna be a good one.”

“Let’s just go physically for now.” She said.

“Honestly no worse than a bad hangover. Not bad, but not great either.”

She opened her mouth to answer again, but snapped it back closed when the door opened again.

Your father walked in. 

You were wrong. This was worse than a bad hangover.

He stood at the opening of the door, before speaking.

“We need to talk.”


	8. Nothing to Say

“No, you need to talk. I have nothing to say.” You said coldly, keeping an icy expression on your face.

“Please, (y/n).” He pleaded with you.

You looked to the others in the room, and Bruce got the hint.

“Okay, well your vitals look normal. So we’ll just be going now.” He motioned for the other two to follow him.

They backed out of the room away from the awkward tension. Natasha turned back to look at you, almost like she wanted to say something, before turning and leaving with the others.

You looked to your father, not saying anything. The tension was so thick you could almost slice through it.

“I need to explain-”

“Understatement of the century.” You interrupted.

“Can we please not fight? I can explain everything.”

“You’ve got some damn nerve. I’ll fight and yell if I fucking want, it’s the least I can do after what you did. And yes, please explain why you left me alone and without a father my entire life.”

“I understand that you’re angry at me, you have every right to be, and I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry? You’re sorry?! You know what? I don’t really think you understand. If you did you wouldn’t even try to get by with that ‘I’m sorry’ bullshit.” You spat, standing up to face him now.

“Then help me understand, we can talk this out and I’ll explain.” He begged.

“Okay. Let’s talk.” 

He sighed a little in relief at your calm tone. But then you continued.

“First, why don’t we start with why you abandoned me? How you knew I existed, but didn’t do anything about it except have some guy keep tabs on me?” You stepped a little closer to him.

“How about you explain to me what motivated you to stay hidden even when my mother died? Why you never came to visit her?” With every word, your voice rose. You kept stepping toward him.

“Or how about the time I had to PLAN and PAY for my mother’s fucking funeral? Something that no child should ever have to do. Wanna explain why you weren’t there for that either?” He was still standing stock still at the door, and you kept advancing.

“How about you explain to me, in great detail, why you were NEVER there? How you faked not knowing me when I got here? How you never even tried to contact me or my mother? How even after she died you never showed?” You were almost in front of him now.

“Or my personal favorite, why don’t you tell me why I had to go through my entire life alone? Why I had to watch her die, or be put in the ground, or wait out every nightmare and panic attack afterward without you? You were supposed to be there. I could’ve forgiven it all if you hadn’t even known about me, hell I could’ve forgiven it if you were honest about it in the first place. But what hurts the most is that you lied. You looked me in the eyes, and you lied to me. So please, explain that. Explain to me why you did, or how you could, or what the FUCK was going on in your head while you did. Because I can’t.” You were face to face with him now.

He just stared back at you. Opening and closing his mouth like a fish. You shook your head.

“When you figure out what you need to say come find me. But you should hurry. Cause I’ve already waited for twenty-three years, and I don’t know how much longer I’ll be willing to wait.” You brushed past him, leaving him standing at the door.

You kept walking, and got in the elevator. Before you could press a button, a voice above you spoke.

“Hello miss (y/n). My name is FRIDAY. Where would you like to go?” You guessed this was the AI Bruce told you about.

“How do you know my name?” You asked.

“Boss told me I should add it to my memory. He hopes you’ll stay awhile, and I am here for your convenience as long as you’re here.”

“I’m gonna take a wild guess and say your boss is Tony?”

“Yes ma’am.”

“Great. Uh, just take me up to the training rooms please.” You asked.

“Yes, miss (y/n).” The AI responded. The elevator moved up, and you tried not to think too hard about what had happened.

When the doors opened up on the training room floor, you rushed out with a quick ‘thank you’ to FRIDAY.

You went to one of the benches, and took your shoes, socks, and shirt off, walking over to a pull-up bar. This was another ritual of yours, when you had nightmares you punched things. When you were angry, you did pull-ups. And you were fucking livid right now.

After about an hour of doing pull-ups, your body was starting to sweat. Beads of it trailing down your chest and your stomach. You took a break for water, then stretched your muscles before going back to the bar.

As you continued your pull-ups, you heard someone walk in. You looked toward the entrance and saw Natasha striding over to you, her hips swaying as she did.

She stopped in front of you, and opened her mouth to speak.

“How are you doing?” She asked.

“We talkin’ about my workout or the asshole who happens to be my father?” You asked with a smirk, and she chuckled.

“The asshole.” She answered.

You switched to doing pull-ups with one arm, something that had taken you forever to be able to do, and responded.

“Ah. Yeah, I really don’t feel like thinking about any of that for a while. Leave a message and I’ll get back to you later.” You smirked at her again and switched to the other arm, noticing how Natasha gave a pointed look at your abs.

“That bad, huh?” She asked, snapping her eyes back up to yours.

“Honestly I’d rather not think about anything right now.”

“What exactly do you want to do then?” She asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Well usually, when faced with a problem that I want to forget about, I go to a bar and pick up a pretty girl.” You drop down from the bar and land right in front of her. You hear her breath hitch at the closeness.

“Know any good bars?” You asked with a shit-eating smirk. You knew exactly how you were affecting her, if the way she was breathing was anything to go by.

She placed a hand on your chest and pushed you back a little, her own smirk growing on her lips.

“Maybe after you get a shower.” 

You gasped in mock hurt, placing a hand on your chest.

“Are you saying I smell, Miss Romanoff?”

“No, but I’m implying it.” Her smirk grew.

“So rude. And here I thought we had something special.” You wiped a fake tear from your cheek, and she rolled her eyes.

“Yeah yeah. Tell you what, I’ll make it up to you.” She said.

“What would that entail?”

“You go take a shower, and I’ll take you to one of the good bars in town.”

You pretended to think, then you smiled at her.

“Sounds like a deal.” You stuck your hand out to shake on it, and she looked at you incredulously.

“Really?”

“It’s not a real deal if we don’t shake hands, sweetheart.”

She rolled her eyes at you but shook your hand in hers anyway.

“Now go shower before you stink up the whole building.” She said. 

You winked at her as you walked away, grabbing your clothes as you walked out.

You ignored for the moment the way your heart swelled when you saw her smile.


	9. Bar Hop

After a good shower and a change of clothes, you were ready to collect on your deal. 

The entire time you were getting ready, you tried not to think about how beautiful Natasha was. But it was hard, really hard. How could you not notice? Everything that she did was hot to you, and you’d only known her for two days. 

But you still couldn’t help but think about her. God, she was pretty. And not just ‘I’d hit that’ pretty. Although if given the opportunity, you totally would. The way her hips swayed whenever she walked, how she smirked, the way her legs went on for days. The past two days you’d known her, your mind had come up with some dirty fantasies.

But her beauty went beyond you just wanting to have sex with her, and you had never felt like this about a girl before. You had been waiting for something like this with a girl for a while, almost so long that you’d started to lose hope. Maybe you were piling emotions on a little too early, you had only just met after all, but you couldn’t deny that you liked Natasha more than any other girl you’d met. 

You shook your head from the thought and shrugged on your leather jacket. You took a once-over of yourself in the mirror, your curled hair, your tight skinny jeans, your jacket. You hadn’t worn makeup, but you never did when you went out. You didn’t really see the point. If you wanted to woo a girl, you didn’t want her to only see the mask of products caking your face. But still, even without makeup, you couldn’t deny that you looked hot. 

You nodded and opened the door to the room you were given. You remembered that Natasha’s room was right across from yours, so you walked over and knocked.

When she opened the door, she smiled.

“Knocking? What a gentle-woman.” She said.

“Yeah, figured I should make a good impression, since you’re so kind enough to show me around town.” You smirked.

“Uh huh. Come on, I know a really good place.”

She grabbed your arm and tugged you gently along with her. 

On the elevator ride to the bottom floor, you noticed how gorgeous she looked. She was wearing a simple blue shirt and jeans, along with a grey, cotton jacket. It was so simple, but damn if she wasn’t still the hottest girl you’d ever seen.

When you walked out of the front doors, Natasha motioned to your car that was parked in front.

“So you said you built this?” She asked.

“Well, not all of it. Just fixed her up and installed all the parts she needed. Took me a long time, but she’s worth it.”

“So when’s the wedding?” She smirked. You scoffed.

“Say what you will, but that truck is the only woman in my life besides my mom that I loved.”

“Seriously? You’ve never loved anybody else?” She asked as she walked with you down the driveway.

“Nope. Been kinda waiting on the right one, if you know what I mean.” 

“So what about all of the girls you’ve picked up over the years? You never dated any of them?”

“Well sometimes I would try, just to see if it could go anywhere, but none of them ever made it past the first date. The rest of the girls I’ve picked up were one-night stands.”

“Huh. You at least treated them well?” She asked.

“Oh yeah. If there’s one thing my mother taught me that still sticks, it’s that you never mistreat a lady. I never hit on them, they would come to me. I was honest if there was no connection, I’d drive them back to their car after, I’d even let them stay the night and make them breakfast in the morning.”

“Wow. That’s strange, but also really sweet and kind. At least you’re not mean like a lot of the world is.”

“I’d like to think so. I figure if I’m only gonna give a girl one night, I might as well try and make it a good one.” You replied.

“So, just out of curiosity... but is it really true what they say about marines?” She was slightly blushing, a pink tint to her face. You knew what she was talking about, but you wanted to tease her a bit.

“What do they say?” You asked with a barely concealed smirk. She coughed.

“Um, you know, about how good they are, in...”

“In what?”

“In bed.” She cleared her throat, and it surprised you how shy she was being about this, being an ex-assassin and all.

Your smirk grew on your face.

“Oh yeah. Completely true. When I fuck a girl, that girl is coming at least four or five times before I’m done.” You said, your voice dropping to a low hum. 

You actually saw her chest stutter. Her cheeks flushed a deep red, and her voice cracked when she spoke next.

“Huh, hm. Yeah, good.” She stuttered out. 

You started chuckling. 

“Aw, did I get you all hot and bothered?” You asked in a lighter tone, amused by how affected she looked.

“Pshh. No, in your dreams maybe.” She replied, her voice coming out a little clearer this time. 

“Well, you would be dreaming about it for a while.” You said in a cocky tone.

She cleared her throat and stopped at an entrance.

“Okay! Here we are!” She motioned at the sign above her, which just said ‘Jamie’s Bar’. You hadn’t even noticed that you’d entered the city, you were so caught up in the conversation with Natasha.

You both walked in and she led you up to the actual bar. 

“What’s your poison?” She asked.

“Whiskey, neat.” 

She told the barkeep your order, and got a scotch on the rocks for herself.

You leaned your elbows against the bar while she jumped up onto a seat beside you.

“So how long do you think you’ll stay at the facility?” She asked.

“Honestly? I don’t know. I’m usually a pretty forgiving person, but this hit really close to home. If I’m gonna stay any longer then Tony’s gonna have to come up with the best damn explanation in the world. I’m talking like, coming to me on his knees and begging me to listen to him.”

“Can I get tickets to that show? I’ve always wanted to see Stark knocked down a peg or two.” She chuckled and you laughed with her, the barkeep bringing over your drinks.

You nursed your whiskey for a moment. 

“So, I meant to ask, but what were you going to tell me in the medbay? You seemed like you really needed to say something.” You asked.

“Oh. Um, I was just gonna say that I’m glad that you’re okay. I was worried.” 

“Really?”

“I mean, yeah. I know we’ve only really just met, but I like you. You seem like a really cool person.” She smiled softly at you, and you smiled back.

“I think you’re pretty cool yourself.” 

“Really?” 

“Yeah.” 

You both smiled at each other for another beat, before she asked you another question. From there, the conversation kept going. She wanted to know everything about you, so you told her. Not the super personal stuff though, you’d save that for later.

In return, you wanted to know everything about her, so you’d asked as many questions about her life that you could think of. She was a little secretive of some things, but you respected her privacy and drove the conversation away from the stuff that made her uncomfortable.

You two talked like that for another hour, before a hand on your shoulder made you turn around.

“Can I help you?” You asked kindly.

A girl with blonde hair was behind you, and she was swaying slightly. You assumed she might be a little more than tipsy.

“I’m hoping so, cutie.” She said, eyeing you up and down with a lecherous gaze.

“Sorry, sweetheart. As nice as I’m sure you are I’m here with someone.” You replied, looking back at Natasha. The girl followed your gaze.

“Oh, you sure? I can make it worth your while.” She ran a finger up your arm. You stopped her.

“Darling, as much as I’m flattered, it ain’t gonna happen. Like I said, I’m with someone tonight.” You were being as kind as you could, but she didn’t seem to be taking the hint.

“Please? I’m very flexible, come with me and I’ll show you.” She persisted.

You were about to reply before you felt an arm around your waist. You looked up and saw Natasha standing beside you.

“Like she said, she’s with someone. Isn’t that right, babe?” She looked down at you, and you realized what she was doing, so you played along.

“Yes, sweetheart.” 

The girl still wouldn’t take the fucking hint.

“Oh, come on, I’ll be much better than her.” God, just how much had this girl had to drink?

“Really?” Natasha asked indignantly.

“Really.” The girl snapped back.

Natasha raised an eyebrow at her, before doing something that you had NOT seen coming.

She grabbed you by the lapels of your jacket and pulled you into a passionate kiss. You froze for only a second before you kissed her back.

The strange girl huffed for a few seconds, before scoffing and and turning to leave. 

When the clicking of her heels had disappeared, Natasha pulled back from the kiss. Her head was down, and she looked suddenly shy.

“Sorry about that, it was the only thing I could think of to get her off your back.” She apologized.

“Sweetheart, don’t ever be sorry about that. It was amazing.” You replied honestly, it might’ve been a little forward of you, but you could give a damn at the moment.

“Seriously?” 

“Yeah, you’re cute when you’re jealous.” You smirked at her.

“What? I was not jealous. I just didn’t like how she was all over you like that.”

“Uh huh. You were jealous.”

“I was not!” 

“The more you deny it, the more it convinces me.” You smirked at her.

“Yeah well, you’re an ass.” She crossed her arms.

“You want me to make it up to you?”

“What?”

“Do you want me to make it up to you?”

“How would you do that?” She asked.

“Well, for starters, I’d take you out. Somewhere where you’d have my undivided attention, preferably a nice restaurant, where nobody is likely to interrupt us. Then after, if you had a good time, and it was mutual, we’d kiss again. Only this time it would be real, and not an act to get rid of annoying strangers.” Now you were the one who was blushing.

“Are you asking me out on a date?”

“Depends. If I was, would you say yes?”

“Um... yeah. I would.”

“Then yes, I’m asking you out on a date.”

“Okay, then yes. I’ll go out with you.”

You were both smiling like morons. But you couldn’t care less. You’re pretty sure you might have just found a reason to stay.


	10. Should I Stay or Should I Go

After a while at the bar, you and Natasha walked back to the compound. The entire way to her room you couldn’t stop the new thoughts that had started to plague your mind. 

You weren’t scared about the date, no. But you were rather worried about what would come after. 

Your dates with women never went well. Almost always, it was just because you never ended up feeling a connection with any of them. It always ended up the same, you’d get a pretty girl from a bar, take her out, and then for the rest of the night you couldn’t help but feel like there was nothing there.

It wasn’t that they weren’t nice girls, or that you didn’t like them, you just couldn’t ever see it going anywhere. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that lust was the starting point of all those encounters.

Whatever the reason, you really didn’t want it to be that way with Natasha. 

When you reached her room, she turned back to you.

“Call me crazy, but I have an idea about what we could do on our date.” She said, wringing her fingers nervously.

“I’m all ears, shoot.” You prompted.

“How about we just stay here? The team doesn’t usually come to this common room, so there’ll be no one to bother us. And we could watch movies and order in some take-out, what do you think?”

“I think that sounds amazing, very low-key, which is my jam. But I do have one tweak to that plan.”

“What is it?”

“Instead of take-out, I’ll cook for you. It’s been a couple of days since I’ve cooked for a girl.” You suggested.

“Well, that’s great, as long as it’s edible.” She teased.

“I’ll have you know, that every single time I’ve cooked for a girl, they’ve sung nothing but praises. Some of them even moaned, which then lead to other things, but you get my point.” You defended.

“Alright, then it’s settled. Quiet night in, a couple of movies, and some nice homemade cooking. What time should we do it?”

“As far as I know, I’m free tomorrow, at 8?” You asked.

“Tomorrow at 8. Sounds lovely, see you then.” She smiled, but hesitated before going into her room.

Then she leaned in, and gave you a quick peck on the cheek, quickly disappearing into her room after.

You stood there for a few seconds, momentarily stunned. Touching the place where she had kissed you. It burned, but in the best way.

“I saw what just happened there.” 

You turned, and saw Steve standing a few steps away from you. It was then that you realized you had been standing there with a dopey smile on your face, and you quickly wiped it off.

“I’ve no clue what you mean, pops.” You smirked.

“Are you seriously jumping on the ‘I’m an old man’ band-wagon too?” He sighed.

“Yup. You’re what now, ninety? I’m surprised you were able to see anything, pops.”

“If you end up sticking around, that nickname better not become a regular thing.”

“No promises.”

“But don’t try to change the subject. I know what I just saw.” He said with a smile.

“And what exactly do you think you saw?”

“You and Romanoff. It’s okay to feel something for her, you don’t have to hide it. In fact, upon your first meeting with her, Sam and Bucky made a bet that you two would get together.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Nope.”

“I’m gonna kill them.” 

He chuckled before walking over to you and placing a strong, comforting hand on your shoulder and squeezing.

“Listen, (y/n). I don’t have a problem with the two of you kids dating, but if you do plan on starting something serious, I need you to actually be serious. None of this stringing her along, or never visiting stuff. Nat’s my friend, so just please, don’t hurt her. She’s had enough of that in her life.”

You nodded at him, and he squeezed your shoulder once more, before striding off. 

That made you think. What if this thing with Natasha DID turn into something else? Something you’d been hoping for? What if you ended up wanting more dates, and then that led to you forming an attachment? You don’t think you’d be able to leave and go back to your old life if that happened.

So you had a really big question to ask yourself, one that no other girl had ever made you ask before. If you did end up liking her a lot, and it grew into strong feelings for her, would you go?

Or had you finally found someone that would make you wanna stay?


	11. King of Romance

To get ready for your date with Natasha that evening, you got dressed in the standard issue SHIELD sweatpants, and a simple T-shirt you’d had cleaned earlier that day. Then at 6p.m., you took a quick look at what the kitchen pantry had to offer.

You wanted to make something simple, but still elegant. And thankfully, they had all of the ingredients for lasagna. Cooking had been one of the skills you’d picked up after the military. You’d been bored, and hadn’t felt like going out to eat again like you had every other night. So, you had looked up some recipes for homemade pizza. From there, you took off.

It had turned out that knowing how to cook had been a very useful topic for conversation, especially when talking to girls. 

You just hoped your skill held up for your date tonight.

Thankfully though, you didn’t have to look up a recipe for lasagna, because you had memorized your mother’s. When you were a child, she made it for you all the time. It was your favorite thing that she had ever cooked for you. And one day after a night of incessant badgering by you, she’d finally shown you how to make it yourself. 

You’d written everything she did down, and throughout the years learned how to make it by memory. You were glad that you did, because it kept a small part of her alive, and loving memories in your heart.

You hoped she’d be proud of you, wherever she was.

After you had finished the lasagna, you turned the oven down to keep it warm while you went to get Natasha. 

You knocked on her door at 7:50, and she opened it with a smile. Her smile could power an entire town, you were sure.

“You’re a little early, you know?” She asked.

“Hey, I was always taught that early is on time, on time is late, and late is unacceptable.” You said back.

“Who taught you that?”

“My first boss, his name was Sully. He’s actually the guy who got me the parts I needed to fix up my truck.”

“Oh wow, that’s cool.”

“So I don’t want to brag, but the dinner I made is probably gonna ruin you for anything else.” You teased.

“Oh really? You seem confident.”

“I think I’ll let my cooking speak for itself.”

“Alright then, what are we having?” She asked.

“Lasagna, my mom’s recipe. And if there was anything that woman knew how to do, it was cook.”

You walked into the kitchen and opened up the oven, taking the dish out and setting it on the counter. The smell that filled the room was amazing. The Parmesan and ricotta cheese, the tomato sauce, the fresh basil, the ground meat. All flavors mixing together and wafting into your nose, reminding you of home.

You were glad that you could share this with her, that in some small way, Natasha could meet your mother. Even if it was just through her food, it was still her. You had to steel yourself against the sudden wave of emotion, and cut yourself and Natasha portions of the dish.

Handing her her plate, you motioned to the couch across the room.

“Why don’t we take this into the living room, dear?” You said in a haughty tone, and she giggled.

“Why yes, honey, why don’t we?” She played along, walking over to the couch and sitting down with you.

While you sat, you waited until she had her first bite. You really wanted to see her reaction to the food, and if she loved it as much as you did.

When the first bite on her fork made it past her lips and hit her tongue, she let out a small groan in appreciation. She didn’t speak as she chewed, her eyes closed.

“Is it good?” You asked, and she held up her hand and continued chewing. You chuckled.

When she swallowed, she opened her eyes and turned to you.

“Nobody is ever allowed to cook for me again. Ever.” She said.

“Didn’t I tell you? My mom don’t lie.”

“God, based on this food, I’m pretty sure your mother was an angel.” She replied, shoveling another bite into her mouth.

Your gaze went distant for a moment as you replied.

“Yeah, she was.”

“Would you mind maybe, telling me a few things about her?”

You looked up at her.

“Or not, I mean it’s probably a sore subject, I shouldn’t have-” She backtracked.

“No, no, it’s okay. I just wasn’t expecting you to ask about her.” You interrupted.

“It really is okay with me if you don’t feel up to it. I wouldn’t be offended or anything.” She reassured.

“No, I want to share her with people. Keep her memory alive. She was great, I mean there’s really no other way to describe her. She made every day her personal mission to make sure that I was happy, that I never noticed that we weren’t as wealthy as others. She was funny, would do anything to make you smile. And her cooking, my God. She could cure any bad mood in the world with her food.” You chuckled, and Natasha smiled.

“She sounds amazing, I wish I could’ve met her. Although she was crazy enough to date Tony.” She smirked.

“Hey! If they hadn’t dated, you wouldn’t be sitting here with me.”

“That is true.” She said as she finished off her food.

“You’re already done?” You asked.

“It was really good, okay? Don’t judge.”

“I’m not. Um, why don’t you pick out a movie and I’ll take your plate?” You offered, standing to do just that.

“Sounds like a deal.” She smiled. 

When you came back and got settled into the couch, she pressed play on the remote and snuggled into your side. You played it as cool as you could and wrapped one arm around her shoulders casually.

When Disney’s Hercules started playing, you couldn’t be bothered to pay attention to it. Your sole focus was on the beautiful girl by your side. 

She looked up part of the way into the movie, and saw you staring. She didn’t say a word, only stared at you the same way you were staring at her.

Then you decided to take a chance, and you leaned in, holding your breath tightly.

When she leaned in also, you let the breath out, filled with relief, and met her lips with yours in a soft kiss. 

When you both pulled back, you smiled at her like she’d hung every single galaxy there was in the heavens.

You pecked her one more time on her forehead and turned back to the movie.

What you didn’t notice, was that now she was also not paying any attention to the film. It seemed that you weren’t the only one who found your date beautiful.

You could get used to this.


	12. Author’s Note

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I’m so sorry, I hate these too.

Hi guys! Right at this point in the story is where I really wanna start kicking things into gear. Maybe a little action and a little angst. I know what I want the angst to be, but I’ve hit a huge wall of writer’s block on what the action should be.

If you guys have any ideas at all what I should do for the next chapter please leave a comment and I will put up the next chapter as soon as you do.

Thank you so much for sticking with the story and for all of your kind words, they make me a better writer. 

To be clear, I absolutely intend on finishing this story. There will be no stopping on my part until it’s done because I can’t stand cliffhangers. But any ideas for the next chapter would be so super helpful, and again, thank you so much!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again I’m really sorry, but I need heeelllp.


	13. Burn, Baby, Burn

At some point during the date, you had fallen asleep. The date had gone well, in your opinion. 

After Hercules, she put in a different Disney movie, this time Tarzan.

“I’m sensing a theme here.” You teased.

“Shut up, I like them. Do not tell Clint, though. I mean it.” She said.

“Your secret’s safe with me, sweetheart.”

After that you’d continued to watch movies. 

Somewhere around the third movie, you had looked down to find Natasha asleep against you. You couldn’t help but smile at how cute she looked. The most badass assassin in the world, curled up at your side fast asleep.

You followed her soon after, adjusting your arm around her and laying your head back against the couch.

—————

You were woken by a click and a flash of light. You scrunched your eyes and groaned lightly at being woken up.

When you pried your eyes open, you saw Clint and Sam above you, both giggling like schoolgirls.

You looked down, and thankfully Natasha was still asleep. You couldn’t help but smile at how adorable she was, and you heard another click.

You snapped your head back up.

“Clint, Sam, I swear to God if you wake her up...” You threatened in a low voice.

“Relax, (y/n)!” Sam said, loudly.

Natasha groaned, and your threatening gaze became murderous. You eased your arm out from under her, carefully laying her down on the couch. You grabbed one of the throw pillows and placed it under her head, just as she began to blink her eyes open tiredly.

“Hey there sweetheart, just go back to sleep. I’m just gonna go and murder Clint and Sam.” You told her softly.

“Mm, okay. Have fun.” She said in a groggy voice.

You stood up and met them with sharp eyes.

You could visibly see them swallow.

“Clint. Sam. Run.” 

They immediately took off, and you cracked your neck before chasing after them. 

Clint disappeared into one of the vents, and Sam kept running ahead.

When you reached where Clint had jumped in, one of his feet were still sticking out of the vent.

You pulled him out and he dropped to the ground on his back. You put one foot beside his head and bent your head down to meet his.

“Who was the one working the camera?” You asked in a blunt tone.

He pointed down the hall to where Sam had run off. You smiled at him.

“You’re safe this time.” You told him before standing up and taking off down the hall to find Sam.

You ran until you came to the end of the hall, which was a dead end. Sam was there, his back pressed up against it.

You took in his predicament.

“You know, this hall is a dead end.” You snarked.

“Yeah, yeah. I didn’t think it through.” He sighed.

You smirked before sprinting the last few feet toward him. He yelped as you lept on top of him, holding him in a tight chokehold.

He struggled in the embrace, trying to escape.

“Holler uncle.” You said.

“You gotta be kidding.” He strained out from between your arms.

You tightened your hold a little.

“Ah-! Okay, okay!” 

You smirked and loosened your hold enough so that he could speak clearly.

“...” he mumbled.

“I’m sorry I didn’t quite catch that.” You smirked.

“Uncle.” He said.

“Mm, no. Still didn’t hear you, sorry. What was that?”

“Dammit (y/n)! Fine, Uncle! Uncle!”

You laughed and released your grip.

He stood back up to meet you, rubbing his throat.

“You’re a mean ass, you know that?” He asked with his own smirk in place.

“Hey, next time, don’t wake up my girlfriend.” 

“Ohh, so Nat’s your girlfriend, huh? Interesting.”

“No, that’s, that’s not what I meant.” You backtracked, realizing what you’d said.

“But that is what you want?” He asked.

“I mean, yeah. But we’ve only been on one date, it’s way too soon.”

“So take her out again. Or just tell her how you feel now. I’m sure she feels the same way, I mean I’ve never seen her this comfortable with anyone else before.”

“Maybe I will, what have I got to lose you know? Life is about taking chances.” You reassured yourself.

“Exactly. Besides, you’ve got nothing to worry about, I’ve seen how she is around you, it’s like she’s relaxed when you’re there.”

“Okay. I’ll tell her, I just need to figure out when.” 

You started to walk back down the hall with him, when FRIDAY spoke up from over you.

“Mr. Stark says for all available members to report outside of the compound, immediately.”

You and Sam looked at each other worriedly, and took off down the hall, meeting Natasha and Clint in the elevator.

“Does that usually happen?” You asked.

“No, but when it does, it means there’s a problem.” Clint answered.

When the elevator stopped, you all ran out of the front door to find the the rest of the team already out there. 

Tony was in his iron suit, and Bruce was now the big guy.

You guessed the rest hadn’t had time to change. 

Steve had his shield, and he handed a bow and a quiver full of arrows to Clint, who quickly knocked an arrow.

Tony called for “the wings of fury”, and a second later a set of wings flew toward your group and latched themselves onto Sam’s back.

Everyone was suited up as well as they could be, and standing side by side.

In the distance, you could see three large vehicles speeding toward the base, along with five motorcycles.

Tony and Steve handed everyone a small earpiece, including you.

“One of the mini drones picked these guys up about a mile out. It’s Hydra.” Steve informed you.

“What are they here for now?” Sam asked.

“It’s Hydra, do they ever have a reason?” Natasha smirked.

“You guys know the drill, eradicate the threat, and if you get killed, walk it off.” Steve said.

Everyone ran to meet the fight, but Tony stopped you before you could go anywhere.

“What do you think you’re doing?” He asked.

“As far as I’m concerned, I’m helping you guys.” You answered.

“No, no way! Absolutely not!” 

“Listen. This is not the time for this, now get out of my way.” You shoved past him and sprinted into the fray.

Steve was busy throwing his shield at the guys on the bikes, and Sam was helping him by flying over them and grabbing them off their bike.

Clint had already shot explosive arrows at the trucks’ engines. The Hulk came in behind him and smashed them up as the soldiers clambered out. 

You ran to meet Natasha and fought to take down the last of the guys from the trucks. 

You both tag teamed and took down several of the guys together.

You were fighting one of the men currently, trying to keep his gun trained off of you while you punched him in the face with your other hand. 

He dropped his gun and you kept your hold on it, swinging the machinery into his skull. He fell to the ground, and you got on top of him. He pulled something out of his pocket, and you felt a stab of pain in your stomach before you hit him again in his temple, knocking him out cold.

You stood up off of him and looked around. That was the last guy, but when you looked at the team, you saw them all staring at you. 

You panted heavily, chest rising and falling.

“What?” You asked. 

“Y-you’re bleeding.” Wanda said, pointing at your stomach.

You looked down at where she was pointing. 

You were still in the sweats and T-shirt you’d been wearing last night. But instead of the shirt being white, it was now largely stained with crimson. 

Now that the adrenaline from the fight was wearing off, you could feel the pain from the wound.

“Oh shit, would you look at that?” You said. 

Your knees wobbled, and before you could collapse, you felt someone catch you and lead you to the ground. 

Natasha appeared above you, you could tell she was pressing down hard on your wound. The pain was bright.

Tony disengaged from his suit and fell to the ground beside you.

You were starting to get really tired.

“No! Dammit, (y/n) no! You don’t get to go now, I never got a chance to talk to you, to explain everything.” Tony shouted. 

Bruce then came up and pushed Tony aside gently. Taking his place and kneeling beside you. He removed Natasha’s hands and pressed his on your wound to try and stop the bleeding.

“Natasha try and keep her awake, we need to move her to the medbay. Wanda can you take care of that?”

“Yes, I got it.” She confirmed.

Bruce kept pressing onto your stomach as you felt yourself being lifted. You were moving along now, but your attention was only on Natasha.

“Hey, so how did I do?” You asked.

“What?” She asked, tilting her head.

“How did I do, on our date?” 

“Oh, you did great! It was amazing, I’m really happy we did it.”

“Good.” You said. God, you were tired.

“Hey, hey, you can’t go to sleep. You have to stay awake!”

“I’m trying sweetheart, it’s not as easy as it looks.”

“What if I made you a deal?”

“I’m listening.”

“If you stay awake, I’ll take you on a second date. I really enjoyed the first, and I don’t want it to stop there.” She said. 

“Heh, that’s funny, I was gonna say the same thing to you.” 

You were in the compound now.

“Really?” She asked.

“Uh huh, I enjoyed our date. And, and...” Holy shit you were tired. It was getting harder and harder to stay awake. The words in your mouth getting more and more difficult to push past your lips.

“Hey. No, no no no no no. Come on, stay awake! We’re almost at the medbay, come on, please don’t fall asleep now!” She begged.

You wanted to tell her it was okay, but your vision started to tunnel. Black was creeping around the edges, and your eyes were drooping lower and lower.

But you really wanted to say one more thing. You gathered the last reserves of your strength, and used it to shove the words out.

“I think... I think I could, love you.” You said.

Then your eyes closed and you fell into the black, watery embrace of sleep.


	14. Out Of The Frying Pan

Your hearing was muffled, but you knew that the voices were panicking. All around you, you could hear people speaking in panicked tones. 

You tried to open your eyes, and when you did, everything was blurry. You couldn’t hardly make out anything but the color white. 

Suddenly a large, blurry blob of black and red was leaning over your prone form. The red color was really pretty, you thought. Like cherries, or roses. 

You noticed that the blob was speaking to you. You tried to figure out what it was saying, but you could hardly make anything out except for garbled noises. It was like you were underwater, only water didn’t hurt this bad.

Another lovely thing you were starting to notice, was that you were in pain. It started as a small pinch in your stomach as you woke up, and then gradually got worse. But on the bright side, the worse the pain got, the more you could see and hear.

You could finally make out snippets of what the voices were saying, and you recognized who they were. You were pretty sure that Bruce and Natasha were the ones standing above you. That explains why the red you saw looked so pretty. It was Natasha’s hair, and the black was her suit. She must’ve changed out of the pajamas at some point.

You were starting to be able to make out more of your surroundings, and you figured out that you were in the medbay.

Oh yeah, that’s right. You were stabbed.

Well, that fucking sucks. And it hurts too, like a lot. You needed to tell someone that. Hopefully they’d give you painkillers or something, cause this was awful.

“Mmm...” Apparently all you could manage was a groan. It did the trick though, because within moments, Natasha was above you.

“(y/n)! Are you okay? Can you hear me?” She said worriedly. You could actually hear her that time, yay.

“Mm hm.” You affirmed. You were really having trouble with forming words at the moment.

“Oh thank God, can you speak? Are you in any pain?”

“Yeah, and yeah.” You managed. 

“We’ve tried to give you morphine but your body is burning it off as fast as we can give it to you. But we have a bigger problem.” She said.

“What?” 

“Well you’ve been asleep for hours, but a couple of minutes ago, a second Hydra team came back. They’re attacking the compound as we speak.”

That woke you up.

“What? Where’s Tony?”

“He’s fighting with the rest of the team. But there’s a lot of them, so we had to stay back in case they get in. We also had to take care of you, make sure you follow up on your promise.”

“Forgive me if I’m a little fuzzy, but what promise?”

“I still need to take you out on that second date.” She said with a smile.

“Ah, that promise. Well, who would wanna miss that?”

She smiled and leaned down to give you a quick kiss on the lips. Then you heard loud shouting in the hall. She looked back worriedly, then turned to Bruce.

“Bruce, this is a code green. When we leave lock the doors to the medbay.” She ordered. 

You heard him start growling then. Natasha turned back to you.

“As soon as this is over, how do you feel about Italian?” She asked.

“Sounds amazing, sweetheart. Go kick some ass for me.” You winked.

“Don’t die.”

“I wouldn’t dare, I have a date.” 

She smiled briefly at you and ran with Hulk out of the medbay. You heard loud roaring as he presumably smashed through waves of soldiers, and you hoped Nat was alright.

After a minute, you started hearing boots stomping closer to the door. 

“Fucking hell.” You mumbled. 

But you weren’t gonna go down without a fight. You struggled, but you were able to pull yourself upright and stand on the floor, leaning heavily on the gurney you had been on.

You stood yourself upright, and lowered into a fighting stance. You bounced on your toes to try and wake your body up a little bit more. 

Your stomach was still wrapped up in bandages, probably stitches too, and they hurt every time you moved.

The footsteps were right at the door now, and you controlled your breathing.

The door burst open. In stepped a woman, dressed down in a Hydra combat suit. When she saw you in your stance, with your legs spread and fists raised, she laughed. You steeled your gaze.

“Do you honestly expect to win against me? With an injury like that?” She sneered.

“Lady, I don’t expect much of anything. All I know is I ain’t going down without a fight.”

“Hm. Well I can admire that at least.”

“Uh huh, whatever. What do you want?”

“What I want, is for Tony Stark to suffer. And you are my best ticket to that.”

“Why is that, exactly?” You were trying to prolong this conversation as long as possible.

“Well, before your father started seeing your whore of a mother, he was seeing me.”

“Gotta admit, didn’t see that coming. So, what does that have to do with me exactly?”

“Idiot. For years I’ve searched for the perfect way to get back at Stark for what he did to me. He tossed me aside, like I was nothing. So of course I had to get revenge, and when I found out who he left me for, I sent a car to finish the job.”

The information slammed into your gut and stopped your heart.

“You... you killed her? You killed my mother?” You asked.

“Yes. But you see, that wasn’t enough. He wasn’t hurting like I was, so I dug deeper into his past. And found you. All I had to do next was come and get you.” She finished, but you were barely paying attention.

Your mother was gone because of her. She killed her. Your eyes hardened, and you started to see a red tinge to your vision.

“My, that’s a neat trick.” She said.

You looked at your hands, which were surrounded by balls of flames. You looked back up at her.

“You killed my mother.” You said through gritted teeth.

You thrust your fist forward, and a stream of fire flew towards her. It hit the side of her face, singeing off her hair and peeling away the skin of her face. 

She howled in agony, dropping to her knees and covering one side of her head.

You controlled your breathing and tried to calm down a little. She stood back up, glaring at you with a look that could kill.

“You. Bitch.” She spat.

“Sorry honey, I’m sure it’s not as ugly as it looks.” You smirked.

She screamed, and lunged for you. 

You blocked her hits, but it wasn’t much of a fight. Your skin was still heated to unimaginable temperatures, so every time she touched you, she was burned.

The more she tried, the worse it got. Her hands were just blistered messes by now, blood dripping onto the floor.

You blocked another punch and threw one of your own. A hard hit to her nose, knocking her head back with the blow.

When her head came back up, she touched her nose, which was also bleeding now. When the back of her hand came away red, she screamed in frustration. 

She swung another hit to your stomach before you could block it, and pain flared across your abdomen.

Your body bent in half as you clutched your stomach, which was bleeding again.

She grabbed your shoulders and threw you onto the ground. 

While you were writhing in pain, she pulled something out of her pocket.

“When I found out about your powers, I had this specially made for you. So you won’t be giving me any problems.” She took out a syringe and got on top of you.

You didn’t know what was in it, but you weren’t about to let a crazy lady stick you with a needle.

She raised her arm, and as she brought it down, you blocked it with both of your arms. 

She pushed it closer to you and you pushed back. You were getting weaker, groaning with the strain, but you refused to just lay down and take it.

You kept pushing back, and she started getting frustrated again.

She took one of her fists and brought it harshly to your stomach again.

Your arms dropped for a split second, but that was all the window she needed. She stuck the needle in your neck, pressing down on the plunger with a smug grin on her face.

You felt a cold substance seep into your veins, spreading throughout your body. 

Your eyes were getting heavy, and the last thing you heard before you slipped away was her laugh.


	15. Rescue

When you woke, the first thing you noticed was the slight nausea churning in your belly. You sat up and surveyed your surroundings. 

You were in a cell of sorts. Other than yourself, there was nothing in it. No toilet, no bed, just four walls and some iron bars for a door.

Thinking back, you remembered why you were here. Some crazy lady that your father screwed over had drugged you. Her motives seemed entirely juvenile to you, she’s gone out of her way to essentially hurt your dad’s feelings.

But she was desperate, and that made her dangerous. Desperate people will do almost anything to get whatever it is they want, so they were hard to talk to. 

Good thing you weren’t planning on talking.

There were ways to deal with people like that. And since their rational sides weren’t functioning properly, they were easy to manipulate. You decided to use that to your advantage.

You stood up from your place on the floor, stretching out your muscles, careful of your stitches.

You checked the still bandaged wound, and found that it looked pretty okay. You were still in your bloody tank top, your SHIELD sweats, and you were barefoot. 

Walking to the door of your cell, you looked outside of it to try and figure out where you were.

It was an incredibly small space, with only one other door besides the one for your cell. You assumed that was the way out. 

The room beyond was empty, all except for a hook at the top of the ceiling, and a table full of surgical tools.

The table had two syringes, one filled with a blue liquid and the other filled with a black liquid. You didn’t know what it was, all you knew was that you didn’t want it inside you.

Besides the creepy needles, on the table was a pair of handcuffs, a gun, a butcher knife, a surgical knife, and what looked like a cattle prod. 

You swallowed, that was not a comforting sight to see. Your dread was steadily growing at what lay in store for you.

The door opened, and in walked the crazy lady you’d fought in the compound. One side of her face was horribly burned, and her hands were covered with gloves. She wore a medical gown, and she glared as soon as she saw you were awake.

She walked to the table, grabbing the gun and the cuffs, then went to your cell. She cocked it and leveled the gun at you, while throwing the cuffs into your cell.

“Put them on. And don’t try anything with your little fire hands, I doubt you could get a hit in before I pull the trigger.”

You bent down, keeping your eyes on her, and picked up the cuffs. You put them on, clipping your hands together on your front.

She kept the gun trained on you, and unlocked your cell with a key she fished from her pocket.

When she opened the door, she motioned you to walk out with the gun. 

You did so, slowly. Then she came up behind you quickly and whacked you on the back of the head with the butt of it.

You cried out and fell to your knees, and you felt her yank you up harshly and pull your hands up to hang on the hook in the ceiling.

You blinked the haze out of your eyes, and saw her setting the gun down on the table. 

Your new position, with your arms high above your head, left your stitches stretching painfully. You could just barely stand on the balls of your feet, and you assumed it was like that to make you extra uncomfortable. 

She brought the table over to your side and picked up the two syringes, holding them up for you to see.

“You’re probably wondering what I’m going to do with these. Well, the black one is interesting. I bought it off of one of my old colleagues, and he said that it contains a stronger version of your mutant gene. Practically painless for a human, but when used on mutants, the stronger gene forcefully rips out the old one and replaces it. I’ve heard it’s incredibly painful, but don’t worry, I’m saving this one for the end.”

She set the black liquid back on the table.

“Now the blue one, is for if you decide to be a brat. It will kill you, but slowly, and painfully. So don’t try my patience, if you cooperate I won’t have to use it.” She said, but you still doubted that she wouldn’t use it anyway.

When you remained silent, she nodded with a sadistic grin.

“Good girl. Now! Let’s have some fun, shall we?” She asked, although you had a sinking feeling in your gut that the ‘fun’ was all for her. You were right.

She grabbed the surgical knife, and proceeded to cut off your shirt. Then she cut through the bandages on your stomach and threw them on the ground.

“Let’s open up these stitches!” She cackled, and then started to throw harsh punches into your gut.

You refused to scream, or cry out, or even groan. You wouldn’t give her the satisfaction she wanted. That was how you would beat her, by not making a single sound or saying a word. 

That was how you usually dealt with these kinds of people, and so far it’s worked for you.

When you didn’t make a sound, you could see her face starting to drop. She picked up the butcher knife next, and pressed it to an untouched part of your stomach. 

Digging the knife in, she dragged it across your abdomen. 

You grit your teeth from the pain, but still didn’t make a sound.

She carved cut after cut into your stomach, they weren’t deep, but they still hurt. 

When she got bored with your front she moved to your back. She laid into it, giving it the same treatment she gave your stomach. You grit your teeth through it all.

She came back around to your front to look for a reaction, to see if she was getting to you yet, and when you gave her nothing but a small smirk she slammed the knife down. 

Grabbing the prod, she flipped a switch on the side and the metal tips ignited with a pale blue electricity.

You internally sighed, and bit down on your tongue to brace for the pain.

“This doesn’t have quite the kick that a normal cattle prod would, but make no mistake, it’ll still hurt like a bitch.” She grinned psychotically, and jammed it into your ribs.

Your entire being tensed, and your eyes clenched shut against the pain. You bit harshly into your tongue, drawing blood from the sheer agony you were in.

It was a wonder you hadn’t screamed. But somehow, by some absolute fucking miracle, you hadn’t made a peep.

She was getting angry now by your lack of a reaction. She howled, like actually howled in anger.

She jammed the prod into you again and again, all over your front, your back, your legs. You’d lost count of how many times she’d used that damn thing on you. 

All you really knew was how much pain you were in right now. It was blindingly excruciating. Like ice and fire in your veins at the same time. It stabbed and it stung and it bruised. The pure essence of the word ‘pain’.

But you still refused to give her the satisfaction of hearing you scream.

The longer you went without making a noise, the more desperate and angry she got. Which was a dangerous combination of emotions. 

Finally, she got fed up, screamed in frustration, and threw the prod across the room. 

Coming up in front of you, she lifted your limp body up and off of the hook. She took the chain between your cuffs in her hands, and pulled you to the front door, your wounds dragging painfully across the rough concrete floor.

Throwing the door open, she tossed you outside and went back into the room you were just in. 

You didn’t have the heart or the will to move or try and take in your new surroundings. You were tired, and you were in a lot of pain.

She came back outside, holding a phone and the syringe filled with the black liquid.

She grabbed you by your hair and yanked you up onto your knees.

“I’m going to call daddy dearest, and you and I are going to wait right here for him. I want him to see.” She said.

She kept a strong grip on your hair, and dialed a number on her phone with the other hand. Holding it up to her ear, she waited for whoever was on the other end to answer.

“Hello Tony.” She said in a frightening tone.

“Who is this?” Tony asked. You could hear him, so she must have had him on speaker phone.

“You know exactly who it is. But that’s not the real question you should be asking.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well I’m sure you must miss your daughter, don’t you? I know if my child had been taken, I’d be asking all sorts of questions about that.” She chuckled.

“What have you done with her? Where is she?!” 

“I know you have people tracking this call right now, so why don’t you come and find her?”

“Do not play games with me! Where is my daughter?!” He shouted. He sounded really worried about you.

“Well she’s right here! Why don’t you talk to her?” She lowered the phone to your lips so you could speak.

You couldn’t keep the tiredness from your voice as you spoke. 

“Dad?” 

“Oh (y/n). Oh my God, honey! I’m so sorry I wasn’t fast enough to stop her! I’m coming for you, baby. I promise, I’m coming to get you, just hang on!” 

Before you could reply, she pulled the phone away from you again.

“Well you better hurry, I don’t think she has long.” She said in a mock worried voice.

“I swear to God, if you touch one hair on her head-”

“Then like I said, you better hurry. See you soon, Tony.”

She dropped the phone on the ground and crushed it under her foot.

She yanked on your hair again, and pulled your head back to meet her eyes.

“You and I are gonna wait right here. When he gets here, I’ve got a surprise for the both of you. I forgot to mention one thing about this serum, once it takes effect, it’ll stop your heart immediately. He’ll think you’ve died, and there will be nothing he can do about it. Oh, it’ll revive you soon after, but that initial moment of terror that will cross his face when he thinks you’re dead, will be worth it.”

“Jesus Christ lady, you couldn’t have just gotten laid after he dumped you or something?” You snarked.

A look of fury crossed her face, before she stabbed you rather hard in the neck with the syringe.

She didn’t say another word, just held onto your hair with one hand and the syringe with the other.

After what must’ve been only twenty minutes you heard a rumbling in the sky, and looked up to see a quinjet landing several feet away from you.

When the door opened fully, the entire Avengers team rushed out. They stopped short in front of you when they saw that she was holding a needle in your neck.

Tony came forward and stepped out of his iron suit, his hand outreached placatingly.

“Please, whatever that is, don’t use it on her. Please. I’m begging you.” He said.

“And why is that?” She asked, pushing the needle further into you.

You could see the looks on the team’s faces, they all looked terrified and worried. Natasha and Tony looked the most devastated, both sporting dark circles under their eyes, like they hadn’t slept in a few days.

You briefly wondered how strong that sedative she gave you at first was.

“Because your fight is with me, not her. I remember you, and I know what I did was wrong, I’m sorry. I have a habit of doing stupid things to good people.” He looked at you as he said that last part.

You smiled slightly at him. If you made it out of this, the two of you were going to have a talk.

“It’s a little late for ‘I’m sorry’ don’t you think? Yeah. All I’m worried about now is making you suffer. The best way to do that, is to take away what you love.” She said, then you felt her push into your neck. You knew what was coming next.

You briefly heard the others shouting, before your eyes rolled back into your skull, and you fell to the side.

—————

You were starting to come to, and you noticed a heavy pressure pushing on your chest. It did it again and again, until the last push knocked the air back into your lungs, and you started coughing and gasping.

You heard a collective sigh of relief from around you, and you opened your eyes.

Above you was your dad, and by your side was Natasha. The team was standing around you in a circle.

“Jesus kid, you scared the shit out of us.” Sam said.

“I’m so glad you’re alright.” Tony said before he snatched you up into a hug.

You weakly hugged him back, and you have to admit, it felt good.

You were surprised though, because you didn’t feel any pain. 

The woman had told you that if she gave you the black liquid it would stop your heart, revive you, and then rip apart your mutant genes. It was supposed to be incredibly painful, but you didn’t feel anything.

It hadn’t revived you, Tony did. And it wasn’t causing you any pain. You were confused.

“What’s wrong?” Nat asked.

“She told me that the serum would hurt. Why doesn’t it?” You asked.

Clint smiled off to your side, and clapped Wanda on her back. 

“That’s because our resident witch was able to draw the stuff out of you.” He said proudly. Wanda blushed.

“It took a lot of work to be able to sense it all, but when I did I drew it out as fast as I could.” She said.

“Thanks sweetheart.” You said, smiling at the teen.

You groaned as you sat up, Natasha and Tony helping you stand. When your knees buckled, Natasha was the first to catch you. She held you up bridal style, and carried you back to the jet with the rest of the team.

You looked up at her and marveled at how stunning she was. If you’d died that would’ve sucked. You would’ve never been able to look at her again.

“God, you’re beautiful.” You said out loud.

She looked down at you and chuckled.

“I should rescue you more often.” She teased.

You giggled tiredly back at her, and yawned. She noticed.

“Why don’t you go ahead and get some sleep? I’ll be there when you wake up.” She suggested.

Under normal circumstances, you would’ve refused. But you were so tired from the events of today, that you didn’t even bother trying to fight.

You closed your eyes and slipped into unconsciousness.


	16. What the Hell?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y’all didn’t think I was gonna leave the reader without some upgrades, did you?

When you awoke in the medbay you felt a weight on your arm. Looking blearily over to your left side, you saw that it was Natasha. She was using your arm as a pillow. She looked peaceful, her face relaxed. She looked more at ease than you had ever seen her before, and it was beautiful. 

You let her sleep for a little bit because you knew she needed it, using the extra time to memorize her features. You don’t think you could’ve found anybody more gorgeous than she was. Not if you’d had a million years to look. 

On your right side, your father was leaning back in a chair pulled up next to your bed. His head was off to one side, and he looked incredibly uncomfortable, but you didn’t have the heart to wake him either. You were still a little mad at him for lying to you, but you knew that he still needed sleep, and you were never one to be petty. 

You waited for one or both of them to wake up, just laying on the bed and enjoying the pleasant silence. After maybe half an hour, Tony started to stir next to you. 

Once he saw that you were awake, he jerked upward in his chair, and you quickly held up your hand and covered his mouth.

“Don’t you dare wake her up.” You whispered, gesturing to Nat with your head.

He looked over and saw that she was still sound asleep, and moved his eyes back to you, nodding his head.

You let go of his mouth and rested your arm on your stomach gently, so that you wouldn’t aggravate your wounds.

“We should talk.” He whispered quietly.

“Damn right, you should.” You answered.

“I’m sorry for lying to you. I should’ve been there. For you, for your mother, for everything you had to go through. But the truth is that I was scared. For me and you. I made a lot of enemies just as Tony Stark, and even more as iron man. And I was worried, terrified, that if I made it public then people would come after you, to get to me. So I kept my distance. But it didn’t work, and someone from my past got to you anyway. I should’ve been there, because then I could’ve at least protected you, and instead, by lying, I separated us. I know that that is in no way an excuse, and I’m not trying to make one. I just hope you can forgive me, and even if you can’t, I just want you to know that I truly am sorry. It will never happen again, and from here on I want you to know that I’m going to be one hundred percent honest with you in the future. I’m really, truly sorry (y/n).” He said.

You stared at him for a moment, before sighing.

“I’ll forgive you, but I’m still mad at you. This in no way makes up for what you did, but I’m willing to give you a second chance. Just know this, there will not be a third. I mean it, this is it. You screw up like that again, and I won’t forgive you, ever. You got it?” You asked sternly, staring him down with absolute seriousness.

His eyes lit up nevertheless, and he nodded with tears shining in his eyes.

“I promise, (y/n). I love you, I want you to know that. Even though you never knew it, I was always proud of you, you grew into an even better person than I could’ve hoped for.”

Tears sprang to your eyes, but you shoved them back down.

“Thank you. Dad.” You said.

He smiled, and grabbed your hand in his, squeezing it tightly and lifting it to his mouth for a quick kiss.

“I’m really glad you’re okay. I was so worried.” He said.

“I knew you guys would find me. Besides, she was really sloppy with her torture technique, I bet I won’t even end up with any scars.”

“It’s scary how nonchalant you are about the fact that you were tortured.” He said sarcastically.

“Meh, I’ve had worse.”

“What?”

“You ever talked to Sam? That’s the worst kind of torture.” You laughed, and you momentarily forgot the sleeping beauty on your arm.

You soon remembered though. The shaking of your shoulders as you laughed jostled her awake. 

“Mm...” She groaned.

“Oh, sorry Nat. I was trying not to wake you.” You apologized.

She blinked groggily at you, before her brain registered the fact that you were now awake. She launched forward and squeezed you in a hug.

“You’re awake! Why didn’t you wake me up?! I was so worried about you! You ass!” She spoke rapidly.

You winced at the pain from your wounds as she squeezed you.

“Ahh... Nat, honey, wounds.” You strained out, she immediately let go.

“I’m sorry!” She apologized, slightly panicked at the fact that she’d unknowingly hurt you.

“It’s okay. How are you feeling?” You asked.

“How am I feeling? You’re the one who was tortured, I should be asking you that.”

“And yet, you didn’t.” You smirked.

“You’re an ass.”

“So I’ve heard. You gonna answer the question?”

“I’m fine. A little tired.” She sighed.

“You can go get some sleep, you know. I doubt anybody’s gonna try and take me again.”

“I’m not leaving. Plus, you still owe me a date. If I leave, how do I know you’ll hold up on the deal?”

“Gorgeous, there’s no way I’d ever miss a date with you.” You smiled at her, and she blushed prettily in return.

Your father cleared his throat awkwardly, having witnessed the exchange. You looked over at him.

“Sorry.” You said.

“It’s fine. I think I’m just gonna go and get Bruce, let him know you’re awake now.” He stood, kissed you on the forehead, and left the room.

You looked back over at Natasha.

“So, how are you really?” She asked.

“What do you mean?” You frowned.

“I mean, I can tell there’s something bothering you. You can tell me, I know we’ve only been on one date, but I still care about you.”

You sighed.

“I’ll admit, that was pretty scary. I’ve never gone through something that intense before, even in the military it was mostly just simple missions, but this was different. It was the first time that I wasn’t in control. I was completely helpless, and it scared me.” You admitted. You don’t know why you felt so comfortable admitting something so personal to Natasha, but you did.

“I understand. Not being in control is a scary thing. But you’re strong, I know that you can get through it.”

“Thanks sweetheart.”

“No problem.”

You two sat there for a few minutes in comfortable silence, just enjoying each other’s presence.

When the door hissed as it opened and Bruce walked in, you tensed as you sat up a little in the bed.

He smiled at you as he walked over, but you could tell that something was off.

“What is it?” You asked.

“Can’t pull anything on you, can I?” He chuckled half-heartedly.

“Bruce, what is it?” 

“Well, it’s nothing bad. But it might be something to look out for.”

“Just tell me.”

“I ran a few blood tests when you were out, just to make sure everything was okay. And I found something, well, not normal.”

“What do you mean?”

“When we came to rescue you, she had a syringe filled with a black serum, do you remember that?”

“Kind of hard to forget.”

“Okay, well she injected it into you before we could stop her. While you were convulsing on the ground, we got to work on taking her out. Turns out that she had had multiple Hydra agents hanging out on the edges of the woods we were surrounded by.” He explained.

“Okay, then what happened?”

“When we got rid of them, Wanda noticed that your heart had stopped beating. She sensed the serum inside of you, but she didn’t pull all of it out in time.”

“What the hell do you mean, ‘all of it’?”

He sighed.

“I mean, that before she could get to you, some of the serum managed to work it’s way to your cells. She pulled most of it out, but the little bit of it that’s still there has completely changed the structure of your mutant genes.”

“Is, is that bad?”

“No, actually. I took a look at them, and it seems that the little bit of that serum you absorbed has exponentially strengthened your mutant genes. I can’t even imagine what would’ve happened had you absorbed all of it.” He said.

“So, I might have stronger, or even extra powers?” You asked, amazed at the information you were being given.

“Possibly. Although we’d have to test it as soon as possible.” He said, and you could tell he was starting to get excited at the possibilities.

You took a deep breath in, letting it out in a whoosh. You tried to sit up even more, but winced at the strain on the stitches in your stomach.

“Yeah, maybe we should try that when you’re feeling better. Thank you, Bruce.” Natasha dismissed him. He nodded.

“Yeah, of course. Feel better, (y/n).” He checked your vitals on the monitor really quick first, then walked out of the room, Tony following behind him.

Tony stopped at the door, staring at you with shining eyes. He swallowed hard, before opening his mouth to speak.

“I’m really glad you’re okay, kiddo.”

“Thanks. Me too.” You said. He then turned to Natasha, pointing at her sternly.

“Take care of her, alright?”

Nat rolled her eyes at the man.

“Yes, Tony. Go get some rest, okay?” She said the last part gently. 

He nodded and gave you one more once over, before turning and leaving the room. The door slid shut behind him.

“You too.” She said.

You looked away from the door where your dad had been and met her eyes.

“Huh?” You asked.

“Get some rest. I’ll be right here.” She promised.

You really did not want to go to sleep though, afraid of what you’d see once you closed your eyes. You hid your fear behind a well-practiced mask, and shook your head nonchalantly.

“Nah, it’s okay. I’m not really all that tired. You can get some sleep if you want, though.”

“Don’t make me sedate you.”

“You wouldn’t.” You challenged. She raised one perfectly sculpted eyebrow.

“You willing to bet on that?” She asked.

You two stared at the other, challenging. Waiting to see who would make the next move, who would crack first. Your stubborn ass refused to back down, no matter how tired you were.

“I’m fine.” You said firmly. Not angry, just getting your point across.

She stared you down for another moment, before rolling her eyes.

“Fine, if you say so. Well, if you insist on staying awake, then I insist that you at least have something to drink. You’re under hydrated.” 

“Sounds good to me.”

“Good. I’ll bring you a bottle of water, don’t move.” She said teasingly. 

“Oh har, har. So funny.” You snarked.

“I know.” She smirked with a shit-eating grin.

Then she got up and sauntered out of the room, her hips swaying deliciously. Even injured and exhausted, you couldn’t help but stare at her ass as she walked away.

She turned and winked at you just before her form disappeared out of the doorway.

You blushed at having been caught staring. And picked at your blanket until she came back.

She handed you the bottle, and you took it while she sat back down at your side again.

You went to twist the cap off, but found it was already opened. You looked at Nat questioningly.

“You’re already weak enough, I didn’t want you to have to struggle with the bottle cap.” She shrugged.

You nodded, still kinda suspicious, but you brushed it off. You really were dehydrated. You drank almost half the bottle without realizing that the water tasted more bitter than usual.

You put the cap back on and set it down on the side table. 

“Didn’t realize how thirsty I was, thank you.” 

“You’re welcome.” She said with a slight smirk.

“What’s the smirk for?” You asked.

“Nothing.”

You narrowed your eyes at her, then noticed the bitter taste in your mouth. You turned to look at your water bottle, and saw a layer of white powder settling at the bottom. 

You looked back at her, eyes wide.

“Did you seriously drug me?”

“Don’t be dramatic, it’s just a light sedative. It won’t knock you out, just help you sleep. You need rest, (y/n).”

You were starting to panic, terrified of what you’d see as soon as your eyes closed. You could already feel your mind getting fuzzy.

“N-nat... I’m scared.”

She reached out and took your hand in hers, and you squeezed it back hard.

“It’s okay, I’ll be right here the whole time. If you have any nightmares, I’ll chase them away. You’re gonna be fine, but you need to rest.” She said gently, laying you back down as your eyes started to get heavy.

“W-will you lay with me?” You asked sleepily. Your eyes fluttered as you desperately tried to keep them open. You didn’t want to fall asleep until she was with you.

She smiled softly.

“Of course.” 

She gently moved you over, and got under the covers with you, taking off her shoes as she got settled.

You cuddled up to her as best as you could, wrapping an arm around her waist and tucking your head into her chest.

She wrapped her arm around your shoulders.

You were barely conscious now, still trying not to fall asleep.

“Go to sleep, (y/n). I’ve got you, I’ll be right here when you wake up.” She comforted you as she ran soothing fingers through your hair again and again.

The motion calmed you down the rest of the way as you gave in and your body sagged in exhaustion.

Before you knew it she had lulled you into a deep, blissful slumber.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry about the late chapter, I just started college and I’m juggling that with work😂
> 
> This story will still be written, I promise!


	17. Recovery

Thankfully, while you slept, you didn’t have a single nightmare. It was the first time in a long time that you’d gotten real, peaceful sleep.

Opening your eyes, you noticed that Natasha was still under you, and you were still wrapped around her. Your head was on top of her chest and you had one arm wrapped around her waist. Both of your legs had tangled together during the nap.

Glancing at the clock, you found that you’d been out for the better part of six hours. You could feel Natasha’s steady breathing under your cheek, and her gentle heartbeat under your ear.

You let that soothe you and closed your eyes again. You weren’t going back to sleep, you just wanted to rest for a bit more. 

“You know that I can tell you’re awake.” She said.

“Mm hmm. Shh, nap time.” You dismissed.

Her chest shook under you as she chuckled.

“You realize that we’ve been asleep for hours, right?” She asked.

“What of it?”

“We can’t sleep forever.”

You sat up and stared at her with incredulity.

“Really? So, first you wanted me to sleep so bad that you drugged me. And now you want me to wake up. Make up your mind, woman.”

She chuckled up at you, and you rolled your eyes.

“By the way, we need to address that.” You said once her laughter had settled.

“What?”

“You drugging me. You’re an ass for that.”

“Hey I warned you that I would. You were the one that was being stubborn about it.”

“Okay, you might’ve warned me, but that doesn’t mean that I actually expected it.”

“Well now you know.” She smirked.

You huffed and thumped back down onto her chest. She gave a small grunt at the added weight.

You lay there for a moment, just enjoying her presence. 

“Hey, (y/n)?”

“Yeah, Nat?”

“You should probably know that before Bruce could properly tend to your wounds, he had to cut your uh, your bra off.”

“Okay. Then whose clothes am I wearing right now?” You had noticed that you’d been changed out of your bloody sports bra and into a new one, along with a clean t-shirt.

“Mine. I saw the size, and we match. So I loaned you some of my clothes.”

“Oh. Well, thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

All the blood in your body rushed to your face as you realized she’d seen you half naked. 

It also occurred to you that you’d been here for days, but you’d only packed two pairs of clothes. The rest of your wardrobe was at your apartment back in Pennsylvania. 

You thought on it for a moment. You needed to figure out what to do. Would you stay? You really wanted to. Plus, with the fact that you had powers now, you probably should stay. You needed to learn how to use them, so shit like crazy ladies kidnapping you wouldn’t happen again.

But first you needed to talk to your dad.

“I need to talk to my dad.” You said.

“Okay. Bruce’ll have to check on you first, he’ll want to know that you’re awake.”

She called for FRIDAY to ask him to come down here, then waited with you.

When he walked into the room, he smiled at you.

“Hey, (y/n). How are you feeling?”

“Oddly enough, I’m feeling way better. Like I’m not in pain, or anything.”

He scrunched his eyebrows at that, but continued with his check-up.

“Okay, well I need to check on your bandages. Make sure that they’ve held up okay.”

He motioned for you to lay on your back. You did, and he pulled your shirt up gently.

Your entire abdomen was wrapped up in white gauze, and he began to gently press on a few places.

“Any of these areas hurt?” He asked.

It didn’t feel like anything. Which was weird, because before you went to sleep you were in immense pain. 

“No, that’s weird right? I’m not going crazy am I?”

“Yes, it’s very strange. Let me take off the bandages and check your wounds.” He said.

He pulled medical scissors off of the metal table behind him, making quick work of cutting off the bandages.

When he pulled them off, you gasped in shock.

Your stomach was completely free of any wounds, the only thing marking you being a thin, white scar where you’d been stabbed.

“That’s definitely strange.” He said.

“Um, yeah. Unless I was out for more than I thought, I should not be healed right now.”

“Actually, this might be because of the serum.”

“What?”

“It looks like the serum did actually give you an extra ability. An increased healing factor, apparently.” He said, amazed.

You weren’t going to lie, that was pretty cool. You wondered what else it had done to you. But you’d think about it later, you had always hated staying in hospitals. And this one was no different, even if it was just a medbay. You wanted to leave, and if you were healed now, you were going to take advantage.

“Well, if I’m all healed up now, there’s no reason for me to stay here right?” You asked.

“I guess not. Just let me check your vitals and make sure and then you can go. But if you feel anything out of the ordinary, I want you to find me as soon as possible. Got it?” He asked, and you nodded excitedly. You really just wanted to leave.

Once he had checked you over completely, he gave you the okay to leave. 

You grabbed Natasha’s hand and pulled her with you out of the room. She pulled back once you were a few feet away and stopped you.

You turned back to look at her.

“Where are you pulling me along to?” She asked with a giggle.

“To my dad, I need to ask him something. If he answers yes, and I’m pretty sure he will, then I’ll need your help.” You explained with a smile.

“What are you gonna ask him?”

“If I can stay here.”

Her eyes lit up, and she smiled.

“You wanna stay?”

“Of course I do. I’ve got three pretty good reasons to.” You said.

“What are they?”

“My powers, for one. I need to learn how to control them and y’all seem to have a pretty good grasp on that kind of stuff. Two, I really need to catch up with my father. I’ve spent twenty-three years without one, and now that I found him I’m not just gonna let go.”

“What’s the third reason?” She asked with a tilt of her head. You smirked.

“Well you see, I met this super hot girl a couple days ago. We’ve only been on one date, but I could totally see it going further than that.”

“Hmm. How hot is she?” She asked coyly, playing along.

“Oh, like drop-dead gorgeous. Almost fainted when I first saw her.”

“Huh, she does sound pretty awesome. But you said you’ve only been on one date, has she asked you out for a second?”

“She has. And I’m hoping to cash that in soon.”

“I have a feeling it’ll go well.” She smirked.

“Me too, but we’ll see.” 

You pulled her along with you again, leading her up to your father’s lab with some directions by FRIDAY. You still didn’t know your way around here completely.

When you got to his office, he looked up from the screens he’d been poring over.

When he noticed it was you, he went straight to you and squeezed you in a hug. You reciprocated.

“I’m so glad you’re okay. Wait, how are you even standing right now?” He asked, pulling back from you and holding you there at arm’s length.

“Apparently the serum gave me a healing ability. I’m all better now.” You explained.

He opened his mouth to say something more, but you cut him off.

“I know, it’s weird. But we’ll talk about it later, I have something to ask you first.”

“Sure, anything.” 

“How would you feel about me coming to stay here? In the compound?” You asked.

“I’d be thrilled! Of course you can stay, in fact you can keep the room you’re staying in now and we can help you move all of your stuff in there. If you’d want, of course.” He said excitedly.

“Thanks, but it’ll probably only take two people. I really don’t have a lot of stuff.” You said.

“Okay, good. Good. Who were you gonna take to help you?”

“Well, I was hoping Nat would go with me?” You asked, turning to her.

She looked at you.

“I mean, as long as you’re comfortable. If you aren’t I can ask somebody else.” You backtracked, before she shook her head.

“No, I’d love to help you get settled here. When do you want to leave?”

“Tomorrow. I’d like to rest for a day, the last few have been literal hell.” You chuckled.

“Of course. Take all the time you need.” She said, your father nodded with her.

“Alright. Good. So that’s settled, then. Thanks, dad.”

“Of course. If you need anything else, please don’t hesitate.” He said, leaning in to hug you again. 

When you let go, Natasha took your hand again and led you down to the residential floor.

When she brought you in front of her room instead of yours, you smirked at her.

“A little early in the relationship to be leading me to bed, don’t you think?”

“Oh hush, we’re not here for that. I just don’t like the thought of you sleeping alone after what happened.” She rolled her eyes.

Then she leaned in to whisper in your ear.

“If I was bringing you here for that, you’d know it.” She chuckled lowly, briefly squeezing your ass before disappearing into her room.

You stood there in a daze, your throat was dry, and blood had pooled in your lower extremities. Your inner thighs were immediately flooded with wetness.

“You coming in, or what?” You heard her shout from inside her room, snapping you out of the daze she had you in.

Clearing your throat and shaking your head, you went inside. 

Oh, how you were liking more and more your decision to stay.


	18. Nightmare

The problem with sleep was that you rarely ever got any. During a good week, you got at most five hours a night. It was fucking miserable, but there wasn’t much you could do about it. 

It was the same nightmare you’ve been having since you were sixteen. Honestly, you could probably handle not getting any sleep if you had different nightmares, but it was always the exact same one. 

Tonight was no different. 

—————

The scene was the same. An empty highway, a burning car, your mother staring at you with blank eyes. 

You still can’t get to her, there’s the same force that pushes you to the ground. Your skin is still burning, tearing off your flesh from the heat. 

But there is something different this time. Instead of the dream ending before your mother can speak to you, this time she says something.

“Embrace it.”

—————

You jolted awake.

You were drenched in a cold sweat, and there was a lone tear tracking its way across your cheek.

Once you had swallowed down the lump in your throat, you looked over to your side where Natasha was sleeping. Her eyes were still closed, and her breathing was even.

Thank God, you hadn’t woken her.

You gently, quietly lifted yourself from the bed and went into the kitchen.

You would usually go somewhere where you could hit a punching bag or workout until morning, but for some reason you just didn’t have the heart tonight.

You poured yourself a cup of the leftover coffee from that morning, and drank deeply from it. 

A small creak sounded from behind you, and you turned.

“I didn’t mean to disturb you.” Wanda said, her head down.

You smiled fondly at her.

“It’s okay, honey. Why are you up so late?” You asked. 

She came over and stood in front of you, leaning on the kitchen island.

“I had a nightmare.” She said softly.

“Aw, I’m sorry. Do you wanna talk about it?”

She shook her head. Even though her head was looking down, you could still see the tears shining in her eyes whenever she glanced up at you.

“Hey, hey. It’s okay, don’t cry.” You said, lifting up her head with two of your fingers under her chin.

As soon as her eyes met yours, the dam broke. 

She started shaking and her bottom lip was trembling.

“Aw, come here sweetheart.”

You tugged her gently into a hug after setting your coffee down on the counter.

She wrapped her arms around you tightly, her small body shaking in your embrace. You let her cry, just holding her and rubbing your hand over her back.

When her shaking had settled you still held her, allowing her to pull away when she wanted.

Her head was tucked into the side of your neck, and you looked down at her the best you could. You needed to distract her somehow.

“Hey so, I’m assuming you’ve heard about my new powers, right?” You asked.

“Right.” She answered in a shaky tone.

“Well I was thinking, that I should probably have someone help me with learning how to use them.”

She picked her head up from your shoulder.

“Who?” She asked.

“You, dork.” You chuckled. Her eyes lit up in excitement.

“Really?”

“As long as you think you can handle it.” You smirked.

She pulled back from you and playfully slapped your arm.

“I can handle it!” She said indignantly.

You chuckled.

“Alright, alright. Well then we can start the day after tomorrow.”

“Why then?”

“Because tomorrow I’m going with Natasha to move my stuff here.”

“You’re staying here?!” She squealed.

“Shhh. Honey, there’s still people sleeping.” You chuckled at her.

“Oh, sorry.” She said sheepishly.

“It’s okay. But yes, I am staying here for the time being.”

“I’m so excited! That’s amazing!”

You nodded with a toothy smile at her excitement.

“Yes. But if I’m going to be ready for tomorrow, then I need sleep.” You said.

She nodded sadly.

“That means you too.” You poked her arm.

“I’m fine.”

You raised an eyebrow at her and crossed your arms. She looked away from you.

“Wanda.” You scolded.

Her eyes flicked up to meet the mom glare you were sending her.

“Will you stay with me?” She asked meekly.

“As long as you promise to sleep.”

“I will.”

“Then lead the way, sweetheart.”

She smiled brightly and tugged you by your hand into her room. When she got comfortable under her covers she patted the spot next to her. You chuckled and got settled in beside her.

As soon as you were lying flat on your back, she snuggled her body close to you. You wrapped an arm around her, and stroked her hair with your other hand.

“(Y/n)?”

“Yes?”

“Can you sing?” She asked.

“I can. Why?”

“Whenever I was little and had a nightmare, my mother would sing to me. Will you?”

“I guess so. What do want me to sing?” You asked.

“Anything you like, I don’t have a preference. I just like hearing it.”

You thought for a moment.

“My mom used to sing me ‘you are my sunshine’. Have you heard that one?” You asked.

“No, could you sing it to me? Please?”

“Sure.”

You took a moment to get more comfortable, before starting the song. Your hand still running through her hair.

“You are my sunshine, my only sunshine. You make me happy, when skies are grey.”

Her eyes began to flutter closed.

“You’ll never know dear, how much I love you. So please don’t take, my sunshine away.”

Her eyes closed and she snuggled deeper into your side.

“The other night dear, as I lay sleeping, I dreamed I held you, in my arms.”

Her breathing got slower.

“But when I awoke dear, I was mistaken. So I laid, my head down and I cried. You are my sunshine, my only sunshine. You make me happy, when skies are grey. You’ll never know dear, how much I love you. So please don’t take, my sunshine away.” You finished the song as her breathing evened out fully.

Somewhere during that song, your eyes had started to water. You could still recall when your mother had sung that song to you.

It was weird how much it still hurt after so many years. And the pain in your heart every time you thought of her never seemed to lessen.

You pushed through it though, like you always did. 

Looking down at a now sleeping Wanda, you smiled. There was no way you were going back to sleep tonight, but you didn’t want to leave her. She’d asked you to stay, so you would.

Instead of going and working out like you normally would, you took your phone out of your back pocket and decided that you’d distract yourself for the rest of the night instead.

While you were scrolling through countless videos on YouTube, you kept thinking about what your mother had said to you in the dream.

‘Embrace it.’ 

Embrace what? What did it mean? And why has your dream changed only now, and never before? 

You didn’t know. You knew that if you kept thinking about it though that you’d just get frustrated. You pushed it down and bottled it up for a later day. You were moving house tomorrow, and there were more important things to tend to than your feelings.

You’d get back to it later. For now though, you just kept scrolling through your phone, waiting out the night.


	19. Moving Day

By the time your clock on your phone had reached 8a.m., Wanda was still fast asleep in the crook of one of your arms. 

She hadn’t stirred for the rest of the night, and for that you were grateful. You didn’t know much about her past, other than she was an orphan. So you don’t really know what caused her nightmare last night, but you were thankful that you could provide her with some solace.

You had asked Natasha to meet you at your truck at 8:30, so you needed to get up now if you wanted time to freshen up for the long drive.

You looked down at her peacefully sleeping face, smiling with a fondness you didn’t know that you possessed. You were beginning to care a lot about these people that you barely knew. 

With Wanda, it was starting to feel like she was almost like a little sister. You didn’t like that she had nightmares, and you felt a need to protect her from all of the bad things she might dream up.

And with the guys, it was like you had really stupid brothers. You joked around with them, made fun of each other, and ninety-nine percent of the time you were exasperated with at least one of them.

Your dad was a difficult relationship. You were still a little angry that he had lied to you, but at the same time you really just wanted a relationship with him. You wanted to go to him when things got tough, you wanted to just sit and catch up with him for hours, and you really just ached for the father you’d never had. You knew it would take a while, but you were at least willing to see this through.

Natasha was something different entirely. You felt something a little deeper than a familial bond with her. Like for your whole life, there had been a missing piece of yourself, but as soon as she came into the picture you finally felt whole. You definitely wanted to keep whatever was between you going, and explore the new territory with her by your side. 

Hopefully the whole moving thing would be the perfect opportunity for that. But first, you needed to get out of the bed.

You gently nudged Wanda, trying to wake her up. All she did was groan and clutch you tighter.

You nudged her again.

“Wanda, sweetheart, it’s time to wake up.” 

She groaned again.

“Come on honey, I know you’re awake.”

She cracked her eyes open, then shook her head and snuggled deeper into you. You tried to think of how you would play this, and then you smirked as an idea popped into your head. 

“Well, I didn’t want to have to resort to this. But you’ve left me no choice.” You said.

Before she could react, you had scooped her up into your arms bridal-style. She squealed in surprise at the sudden movement.

You stood from the bed and made your way into the kitchen. Natasha was already there, brewing a new pot of coffee.

When she heard you come in, she turned around to meet you. Upon seeing your cargo, she smirked.

“Well, what do we have here?” She asked.

Wanda hid her embarrassed blush in the side of your neck. You chuckled.

“Little missy here didn’t want to get up, so I made her.” You smirked.

Natasha laughed, and Wanda clutched onto you tighter. You looked down at her, and bounced her a little in your arms to get her to look at you. 

“Hey, we’re not making fun of you, honey. There’s no need to be embarrassed. Tell you what, I’ll let you go to get dressed and when you come back there’ll be pancakes waiting for you. How’s that sound?”

She nodded with a bright smile and you let her down on her own two feet gently, watching as she quickly disappeared back down the hall to her room.

You looked in the cabinets and found the stuff you needed to make pancakes, getting it all down and starting the mixture.

Natasha watched you the whole time with a smirk.

“You have a soft side.” She teased.

“I don’t know what you mean, sweetheart.” You side-eyed her with a smirk, heating up a pan on the stove.

“It’s a good thing. She’s been through a lot, so it’s a good thing she likes you. You and Vision are the only ones so far that she’s really opened up to.” 

“Why Vision?” You asked as you poured a bit of the mixture into the pan.

“Well, I have a pretty good hunch that she likes him.”

You turned to her.

“Like you and I do?” You asked.

She nodded.

You felt a sudden urge to both protect her and kill Vision. Apparently Natasha could tell by the look that had overtaken your features exactly what you were thinking. She chuckled.

“Ooh, the soft side is strong with this one.” She grinned.

“Huh?” You asked. She looked appalled.

“Seriously? Star Wars reference? You didn’t get it?” 

“Sorry sweetheart.” You shrugged, flipping the pancakes.

“Blasphemy. You weren’t raised right. No, I’m not gonna let this stand. As soon as we get home you and I are bingeing a Star Wars marathon.” She said.

You chuckled lightly at the offended look on her face. Plating the pancakes and setting them out just as Wanda emerged from the hallway.

“Oh, it smells amazing in here!” She groaned. 

She took a seat at the kitchen island and you placed her plate in front of her. She immediately dug in as soon as you gave her a fork, stuffing a bite into her mouth and moaning at the taste.

“It’s good?” You asked with a smile.

“It’s fhe befst.” She said with her mouth full. You chuckled.

“Honey I did not catch a word of that.” You said. She swallowed the bite and repeated herself.

“It’s the best.”

“I’m glad you like them. Well, Nat and I should get going. You okay?” You asked her. She nodded from her plate, not bothering to look up from her food.

You rolled your eyes and chuckled again, motioning for Natasha to come with you.

“We’ll see you later, Wanda.” Natasha told her, again the girl didn’t look up once from her plate. Only nodding and giving a quick wave as she continued to scarf down her food.

Once you were in the elevator Natasha turned to you.

“So it’s not just me, you really are a goddess in the kitchen.” She praised.

You gave a full-hearted laugh at her words.

“I may have been told once or twice some similar words.” You said with a huge smile.

“Don’t let the guys know you can cook, otherwise you’ll be doing dinner every single night.”

“Something tells me that that’s true.”

When the elevator stopped, you both got out and walked to your truck that was still parked out front. 

Getting in and starting her up, you thanked God that you still had half a tank of gas. You’d fill her up once you made it into your hometown.

Pulling the car out of the driveway and down the road, Natasha started asking you about movies you watched. You continued to surprise her when you’d told her that you never really had the time for them. 

That led into a long debate that lasted for most of the trip.

—————

When you finally pulled into your hometown, you pulled into the first gas station you saw where the prices were affordable.

Putting the car in park, you turned to her.

“I’m just gonna head inside real quick and pay for gas, you want anything?”

“Mm, maybe just a water? If that’s alright?” She asked.

“Of course, darlin’.” You smiled and hopped out of the truck. 

You checked which pump you were at and headed inside, grabbing two waters and walking to the counter.

“Twenty dollars on pump three, please.” You said to the cashier, setting the waters on the counter.

She rang everything up and bagged your waters, handing you the receipt. 

You thanked her and walked back outside, before you could reach the pump, some asshole stopped in front of you.

Looking up at him with a bored expression, you raised an eyebrow.

“Do something for you?” You asked in a clipped tone.

His sleazy gaze raked up and down your body.

“Gettin on your knees for me would be a nice start.” He said. Ugh.

“No thanks honey. This washing machine doesn’t handle small loads, you’ll have to do it by hand.” You snarked with a shit-eating grin, side-stepping him and continuing to your truck.

He stopped you with a hand gripping your arm.

“I don’t take that kind of talk, bitch.” He sneered.

Glancing down at his hand, you raised your unimpressed eyes back up to him.

“Good thing I don’t really give a damn. Now let go before I do something.” 

He laughed darkly at you, clearly not taking you seriously.

Before you could follow through on your promise, someone wrenched his arm off of you and kicked his legs from under him. He flailed as he hit the ground.

You looked up and saw Natasha. She was glaring harshly down at the man. Damn, the look on her face right now was so hot.

“The lady asked you to back off.” She said.

The man got up angrily and faced her.

“This has nothing to do with you, bitch. I don’t have to listen to a damn thing you say.” He spat.

“Well then good news, today’s the day a girl is gonna touch you in your special place.” You smirked, before putting a massive amount of force behind a well-placed kick.

He doubled over and vomited on the ground, clutching his manhood.

You turned to Natasha and smirked.

“The last time I ended up having to do that, I found out I actually made the guy’s testicle rescind back inside him.”

“Ooh.” She mock hissed in empathy.

Then you both headed back to your truck, handing her her water and pumping your gas. 

When you were done the man was still clutching himself, cursing at you. You paid him no mind and got back into your truck, driving off towards your neighborhood.

When you got to the old apartment building you lived at, you opened your door and came around to the passenger side quickly to hold the door for Natasha.

“Such a gentlewoman.” She smirked, taking your hand and letting you help her out of the car.

You led her up to your door, turning the key and opening your apartment.

Walking in with her, you looked around at the virtually empty space.

“Wow, you were not kidding about not owning much were you?” She asked, glancing around.

“Nope. Most of the stuff I do own is in the bedroom. Quick word of warning though, when you see the nightstand, don’t open it.” You told her. She looked at you with curiosity.

“Why?” She asked slowly.

“Because I’d rather save the stuff in there for after the third date.” You said bluntly.

“Again, why?”

“Natasha, sweetheart, what do third dates usually lead to?” 

“Sex.”

You stared at her for a moment, letting her grasp the meaning. When she finally clicked the pieces together her eyes widened.

“Oh. OH!” She gasped.

“There you go, sweetheart. For a master assassin and expert spy, that took you a minute.” You said with a smirk.

She glared at you in mock-offense. You just chuckled and led her into your bedroom.

She sat on the bed before you could warn her.

“Oh, um, I should probably tell you that I didn’t get a chance to wash those sheets after the last girl.”

She thought again for a moment before she got the implication. Then she snapped up from the bed with a slightly disgusted expression while you just smirked at her.

“Ugh, where is it okay to sit in here?” She asked.

“You might just wanna continue standing.” You chuckled at her.

“Had no idea I was dating such a player.” She teased, coming up beside you.

You slapped her lightly on her ass and she yelped, glaring at you. You couldn’t help the laugh that tumbled out of you.

“That wasn’t funny.” She said, fighting a smile.

“Yes it was. It really was.” You continued to laugh, grabbing a couple of stray boxes from inside your closet. You always kept a couple of empty boxes just in case.

Once your laughter had settled and she gave in and smiled at you, you motioned her to help you with the first box.

“Can you help me with the clothes first?” You asked. She nodded, putting the wardrobe into the biggest box.

Once your closet rack had been cleared and the box closed up, you moved on to the next, which was your nightstand.

“Um.” She said, remembering what you’d told her was in there.

You smirked at her.

“You sure you can handle this, sweetheart? Didn’t take you to be so squeamish about sex.” You said.

“Well considering I’ve never had it, it shouldn’t be that hard to believe.”

“Wait, what? You’re telling me that you have never, not even once?” 

“Like I told you, for a long time I was convinced that love was for children. That made sex a distraction, something that wasn’t worth the time.” She explained with a shrug.

“Have you ever done anything to yourself? Wait. You don’t have to answer that. That’s personal shit, I don’t even know why I asked.” You quickly backtracked, afraid you’d overstepped a boundary.

She chuckled. 

“No it’s fine. I mean, I’ve done things by myself a few times, when I was particularly frustrated.” She answered.

Your pupils dilated at the images that suddenly flooded your mind. The thought of Natasha on her back in her bed, her fingers buried deep inside herself, her moans as she reached release. 

She snapped her fingers in front of your face.

“Hello? Earth to (y/n)?” She asked.

You shook yourself out of your head. Taking a few moments to steady your breathing.

“I’m totally fine. Let’s keep packing, you can use that box there to pack the stuff in my dresser. I’ll take care of the nightstand.” You said, clearing your throat of the sudden dryness.

She smirked at you, seeming to realize what you’d been thinking of, and moved to do as you’d asked.

You cleared the rest of the lust from your head, and quickly packed up your nightstand’s contents.

When she was also finished with your dresser, you picked up the last empty box.

“Wait, three boxes? That’s all you needed?” She asked.

“Well, that and the fourth one. But that’s for food. Luckily I just used the last of the stuff in my fridge a couple of days ago, so we just need to get the crap in the cabinets.” You said.

Natasha was looking around, as if trying to find anything else you might’ve owned. Then her eyes landed on something under your bed.

You knew what she was looking at. You didn’t move as she grabbed it and pulled it from under your bed.

“Don’t open it.” You pleaded in a soft voice.

She looked up at you.

“What’s in it?” She asked.

“Letters from my mother to my dad. It was all she’d left for me when she’d died. I hadn’t had the heart to open it until a few days ago.” You swallowed thickly.

“You should talk about it, it might make you feel better.” She suggested softly.

You shook your head and took the box from her, setting it on top of one of the others.

“Nah. It happened a long time ago, no use digging it up now. Come on, help me in the kitchen please?” You asked, walking out of there before she could respond.

You started throwing open the cabinets, grabbing the few boxes of food you had left and placing them in the empty box you were holding.

Natasha came up behind you and gently took the box from your grasp, holding it open for you as you continued to fill it.

When you were done you took it from her again and closed it up, getting frustrated when the box tape wouldn’t cooperate with you and slamming it down on the counter.

You braced yourself on the countertop, hanging your head and taking deep breaths.

You stood there in silence for a minute, before you felt hesitant hands wrap themselves around your waist.

Almost immediately you calmed down, just standing there and allowing her to hold you.

After a moment you brought one hand up and held her arms in place around you. Taking comfort in how soft her skin was on your fingertips.

You sighed a long, tension releasing breath from your lungs, standing up and turning around to face her.

She didn’t let go of you, keeping her arms around you as you wrapped your own around her neck and leaned your forehead against hers.

You closed your eyes again and let yourself just be. 

After a couple of minutes had stretched, you opened your eyes and pulled back to look at her.

“Thanks, sweetheart.” You said.

“Anytime.” She replied with a smile.

You both let go and she helped you close the last box. You both took two boxes each and packed them into the bed of your truck. You took your mother’s letters yourself.

You had let your landlord know yesterday that you were moving out and told him you were giving in your three-weeks notice. 

You’d arranged to pay the last month of your rent and he’d told you he was sad to see you go.

Opening Natasha’s door for her and helping her in, you closed it back when she had fastened her seatbelt.

Then you went around to your side and did the same, turning the keys in the ignition and pulling out of your old life for good.

Natasha reached her hand across to you and interlaced her fingers with yours. You glanced over at her and smiled, squeezing her hand in yours as you kissed the back of it. 

Turning back to the road in front of you, you focused your sights on the future. You had no idea what lay ahead, but you knew that as long as Natasha stayed by your side, everything would work out.


	20. Saying Goodbye

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reader is told to let go, and is forced to finally come face-to-face with all of the feelings she’s held back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Get ready, prepare yourselves, cause this is a rather painful chapter. Not gonna lie, but I literally cried when I was writing this.
> 
> No one dies, don’t panic! But there’s still angst.

As soon as you had gotten everything up to your room and unpacked, putting the food into the pantry, you sat in the middle of your bed. Staring at the box that was the source of most of your pain.

Natasha had asked if she could help you with anything, but you told her that everything was okay and that you would see her later. 

You didn’t like to lie to her, but you didn’t want to worry her with something so trivial as feelings. 

So there you sat. Trying to figure out what the hell to do with this stupid box. You’d already read all of the letters, knew what they said, and found what your mom wanted you to find. 

As far as you were concerned, you were done with them. I mean, you’d done everything that you could with them. Now they were just a bunch of old letters.

But it felt so wrong to just get rid of them. How could you? It was the last piece of your mother you had left. You couldn’t possibly just throw them out. 

No. You wouldn’t throw them away. But you couldn’t keep them either. You needed to let go, and move on. So you decided on what you were going to do.

You picked up the box and swung yourself off of your bed. Walking to the elevator, you pushed the button that led to your father’s lab. 

When the doors opened, you got out and briskly walked through the space to find your father with his nose halfway into a microscope. 

Upon hearing your footsteps, he looked up and smiled wide when he saw it was you. When he also saw what you were carrying, his smile turned confused for a moment.

“Hey, (y/n), what a nice surprise. Whatcha got there?” He asked, gesturing to the box in your hands.

Suddenly what had felt light as a feather, was now a hundred pounds of deadweight resting in your arms. You swallowed, the boulder-sized lump going down like glass.

Clearing your throat of the sudden onset of emotion, you answered him.

“It’s uh... mom. These are from mom.” Was all you were able to get out.

“Oh, what do you mean, ‘from her’?”

“I mean, that this is what she gave me when she died. This box, is how I found you.”

At that, his face went several different shades of pale.

He hesitantly, ever so gently, took the box from you when you held it out to him. Setting it down on the table in front of him, he gingerly lifts the lid off of the box.

Once he realizes what he’s seeing, he takes his glasses off and wipes discreetly at the corners of his eyes.

He turns up his head to meet your gaze, and smiles tearfully.

“This is her, huh? She’s really gone.” 

You nodded, not finding it in yourself to say anything. It felt like you couldn’t control the muscles in your throat enough to produce any sound. Like your jaw was painfully tensed and locked up.

He picked up one of her letters and opened it, reading through her terrible handwriting. You had always laughed with her about how chickens could probably write better than her. 

“Even today, I still have to read through it a couple of times to even read her writing.” He chuckled.

You took a deep breath in and held it to keep the emotions at bay, even though they felt desperately close to completely spilling over.

“Yeah. I always made fun of her for it.” You said, your voice cracking. You covered it up by coughing into your shoulder, looking anywhere but at Tony.

“I remember the exact day she wrote this one.” He said, and your head snapped back to him.

“What?” You asked dumbly.

“Yeah. I was at work, she had only just moved away. I was so tired, close to snapping at somebody, when my secretary came in with this letter.” He held it up to emphasize it.

“She wrote about all the things she missed about me, how she wished she could’ve stayed. You know why we separated?” He asked. You shook your head.

“She got a job offer. It would take her out of state, and I wouldn’t be able to see her that much. But she still promised she would write, and she did.”

“Well then, what happened?” You asked.

“She called me one day, said she couldn’t do it anymore. The long-distance was killing her, and she felt like she was being pulled apart. I asked if we could meet up, one last time, to say a proper goodbye. I wasn’t gonna try and make her stay, this job she was taking was gonna be good for her, so I just wanted a chance to lay everything on the table.”

“Then what?” 

“We met on a set date, and said everything we needed to. I told her I was proud of her, but that I was sad to see her go. She said the same, but also that she didn’t want me to wallow. She said, and I quote, ‘Tony Stark, you had better find some way to get off your ass and be happy when I’m gone.’” He chuckled.

You smiled wetly, the lump beginning to work its way back up your throat.

“Nine months later, she sent me another letter that I’ve always kept with me. In here. Do you want to see it?” He asked. You nodded, with the lump back you couldn’t say anything else even if you’d wanted to.

He went over to a desk at the back of the room, pulled open a drawer, and unlocked a panel on the other side. He took what was in it, then closed the secret panel back up.

Walking over to you, he handed you the envelope that he had in his hand.

You took it shakily, slowly opening it to reveal a picture. No letter, just a picture. On the back it said, ‘Little (y/n) Stark, a new light in a world full of darkness.’ You turned the picture over, and there was your mother. 

She was absolutely glowing in the picture, sitting in a hospital bed, wearing a gown, and holding a little baby you in her arms.

The more you looked at the picture, the blurrier it got. Until you realized it was so blurry because your eyes were filling rapidly with tears. 

You felt a hand on your shoulder, and looked up to see your father looking at you.

“It’s okay to cry if you want to, letting go of something like this can be hard, I understand.” He said.

You harshly wiped at your eyes before the tears could fall.

“What are you talking about? I let go a long time ago.” 

“(Y/n), you’re hurting, it doesn’t take a smart person to see that. But it’s okay to feel that way, you don’t have to brush it off.”

“It doesn’t affect me, alright? I’m fine. I let go already.”

“Have you really?”

“What?”

“Have you really, truly, let go? Have you ever had a good cry about it? Have you ever just let yourself feel this?” He asked.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” You said, starting to get frustrated. Where did he get the gall to call you out on something like this?

“I think you do, sweetie. I know that I wasn’t there to help you feel back then, but I’m here now. You can talk to me.”

“Tony, I’m fine. Seriously.” The cracks in your voice did little to help your case.

“It’s okay to let yourself feel this, it’s okay to let go.” 

That set you off.

“Let go? Let myself feel? Are you serious?”

“(Y/n)-”

“No! No, I won’t just ‘let go’ of my mom! Do you understand how crazy that sounds? So what, I’m just supposed to forget about her and move on?”

“No, you’re not forgetting her, you’re just letting go of the pain. And to do that you have to let yourself feel it.”

“Wow. Yeah, great advice. Really. What exactly do you think I’ve been feeling for the past six years since she died? That’s all I’ve ever felt is pain. Pain every time I think about her cooking, her smile, her hugs, how she made me laugh. Pain every single day I had to be in a room without her. Whenever I would get out from school, and she wouldn’t be there to pick me up. Pain every single fucking time I would eat, but she wouldn’t be at the table across from me.” 

He looked on in silence, just watching you fall apart for the first time since she died.

“The ‘pain’ is all I’ve ever been able to feel or even think about! Every. Single. Day. How I’ll never hear her speak again, or get a cooking lesson from her, or just fucking hug her when I’ve had a bad day so she can tell me everything will be alright! But it won’t be! Nothing will ever be alright again! Because she’s gone! Do you get that?”

The dam just kept fucking breaking, until it flooded.

“I don’t want to feel this pain because it’s killing me! Weighing me down every step I take, burning me from the inside out! It feels like there’s a million pound weight tied to my heart, and it’s just ripping it out of my chest with each breath I struggle through! I can’t let myself feel it, because then it’s real! Then she really is gone, and I don’t have my mama! I don’t! She’s gone! SHE’S GONE!”

With that you let out a gut-wrenching scream filled with all of the pain you’d held in or forced down. You hugged yourself tightly at your middle and sank heavily to the ground on your knees.

Touching your forehead to the ground, you sobbed with a force that shattered all of the bones in your chest. Your mouth hung open in a silent scream, the only sound coming from you being your cries.

The tears flowed in heavy streaks down your red, blotchy cheeks. Your entire being was shaking behind the force of your sobs. Your knees throbbed from where you’d fallen on them, but you couldn’t care less. 

Why would you? What was physical pain, when your mama wasn’t here to make it better? The crushing pain in your chest cavity was worse than being stabbed. Honestly, you’d rather you were just stabbed or shot instead of this. Anything would be better than having to live with this. 

You felt your dad pick your head up off the floor, kneeling in front of you, his own eyes shining with tears.

You lunged forward without hesitation and clung tightly to his chest. He held you without a second of thought, just feeling and being with you in the moment.

“Why? Why did she leave me? Why did she have to go? I wish she would just come back, I want her back dad. I just want my mama back.” You cried into his lab coat, staining it with your tears, with your pain.

You felt raw, like someone had taken steel wool or a wire brush to the deepest reaches of your soul.

“I don’t know, baby. I’m so sorry, I loved her, too. I wish she was here too. I’m right here sweetie, let it all out, let it all go.” 

With that, you just stayed there and sat with your dad in the middle of his lab floor. It could’ve been minutes, or hours, or hell, even days that you sat there. Just feeling the pain, and crying it out. 

Although it hurt like the worst kind of hell, it also lifted the perpetual, crushing weight off of your heart. By finally letting yourself feel the pain you’d been desperately trying to hold back, you were able to heal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case you were wondering, reader’s mom is based off of my grandmother. This is the gist of how I felt when she died, and I really wanted to capture the true essence of grief there, so I was as honest as I could be.


	21. Healing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to all you guys who’ve stuck with me this far, and for all of your kind words; you’ve no idea how much it means to me🥰

You didn’t think you’d ever cried this much in your entire life. You don’t think you’ve ever really cried. But right here, right now, was the most raw display of emotion that you’d ever felt or shown.

For what you were positive must have been hours, you just sat there. Crying. 

Your dad just held you as you did the same, clutching him so tightly you were sure you’d crack a rib if you gripped any harder.

He didn’t say anything. Knew that he didn’t need to. He just sat there with you and held you through it, letting you get it all out.

And dear God, did you let loose. The sounds that came out of you were ugly, and broken, and painful, but they were also freeing. With every sob, a little more of that crushing weight disappeared. With every cry, the tension you’d built up would melt away. With every shake of your shoulders, the walls that you’d spent years building would crumble.

It felt so good to finally let it all go. To not hold back and just fucking cry for once. You’d always thought that if you ever let yourself feel this pain, that it would only get worse. So you’d pushed it down, or brushed it to the side. Bottling it up for later, but ‘later’ never came.

You were wrong, so wrong. By finally letting yourself feel everything you’d tried so hard not to, you were able to let it go. You were able to heal the gaping, marring hole in your chest. And you realized that you could actually breathe again.

It would still take a while to fully heal from this, but at least you were off to a good start. 

After a long while, you were finally able to calm down a little. Your cries and sobs reduced to tiny little whimpers and sniffles. 

But you never let go of your father. And he never let go of you. His hold never wavered, he just wrapped you up in a comforting embrace, one of his hands combing through your hair. 

Even when you had gone completely quiet, you were still holding each other.

Until finally, you took in a deep inhale of air, let it go, and sat up out of his hold. You wiped your eyes, and ran a tissue that he pulled from one the nearby tables under your nose. 

“Ugh, I’m sorry you had to see all that.” You chuckled wetly.

He gave you a tender smile, and cupped one of your cheeks in his hand.

“You never have to be sorry for letting me be your dad. That’s what parents do, they hold their children through the rough patches. I’m just sorry it took me so long to get there.” He said.

You had to push another wave of tears back, though you were sure you had been cried out.

“Thank you. For being here for me. It means so much.”

“No problem, sweetie.”

“Just for future reference though, maybe don’t wait for twenty-three years the next time I need a hug.” You laughed.

He chuckled along with you, and grunted as he got up to stand. He stood, and held out his hand to help you up.

You took it, and stood up with him. He brought you into another hug, and you clutched him tightly for a few more moments before you let go.

Your eyes were all dried out and itchy, and you were exhausted from having cried so much. You let loose a jaw-cracking yawn.

“Go get some sleep, kiddo. A little birdy told me that you have training tomorrow.” He chuckled. You groaned.

“Oh, come on! I already went through boot camp, now I gotta do it again?”

“Afraid so. Don’t worry, I’m sure Natasha will go easy on you.” He said behind a hidden smirk.

Your head snapped to his.

“Nat’s training me?”

“Yup, Cap was gonna do it, but she volunteered.”

“Huh. Cool, I guess.” You shrugged, trying to seem indifferent to it.

“Play coy all you want (y/n), we all know that you two are dating.”

“What? I mean, yeah, I guess we are. But we’ve technically only gone out once, so.” You trailed off. Tony just looked at you with an eyebrow raised.

“Really? You’re gonna play that card?” He asked.

“What’re you talking about?”

“Oh come on, you know what I’m talking about. I see the way you've both been looking at each other lately.”

“Look, yes, I like her. But we’ve only gone out once, I think we’d have to go out at least two or three more times to really be able to put a label on it.”

“But you do want to?”

“What?”

“You want there to be a label?”

“Of course I do! Nat is unlike any other girl I’ve ever gone out with. She’s funny, cute, smart, badass. Not to mention, incredibly hot.” You smirked.

“Ugh, gross. I do not need to hear about what my daughter finds ‘hot’. Go to bed.” He shooed you out of his lab, and you chuckled as you turned to go. 

You really were tired, and totally not about to deny some much-needed sleep.

Before you could completely disappear out the door, you turned back.

“Dad?” You asked.

“Yeah?”

“Thank you.”

He only nodded with a sincere smile, and then you turned to leave.

As soon as your head hit the pillow, you were out.

—————

When you woke up it was not because you’d wanted to, it was because you felt a weight thump onto your back, knocking the breath out of you.

“Mm.” You groaned, and whoever had jumped on you giggled. 

You turned your head back to identify the culprit, and found Wanda sitting in the middle of your back. She was smiling childishly at you.

“You seem happy this morning.” You mumbled sleepily.

“I am, I get to help Natasha train with you today.” She bounced on your form excitedly, jostling the bed.

You chuckled at how giddy she was.

“You know, if you don’t get off of me, we’ll never get to training.”

At that, she quickly rolled off of you and plopped herself on the other side of your bed.

You sat up and stretched, yawning widely. You rubbed your slightly sore eyes from all the crying you’d done, and went into your bathroom.

You splashed some cold water on your face before grabbing your toothbrush and the toothpaste, putting a small amount on it. 

When you were done brushing your teeth, you went to your closet to get changed into some workout clothes, settling on a black tank top and leggings. You tied up your hair into a pony tail, put on your tennis shoes, then went into the kitchen for some breakfast. Wanda followed right behind you.

You saw Steve, Bucky, and Sam already in there. Steve was frying some bacon in one pan and some eggs in another, while Sam was criticizing him from the kitchen island. Bucky was sitting beside Sam, just chuckling at the whole exchange.

“I’m telling you man, you are going to burn my bacon if you don’t flip it soon.” Sam chided.

“Who exactly told you that you were getting any?” Cap snarked, not taking his attention off the food.

“Excuse you, but if I don’t get my bacon, I’m hell to work with.” 

“You’re hell to work with anyway.” Bucky chuckled at his side, and Sam lightly shoved his shoulder.

“Shut up, Barnes, it’s not exactly like you’re all rainbows and kittens either.”

“Boys, boys, you’re both very pretty. Now can you shut up a little?” You smirked, walking in to sit in front of them at the island, Wanda taking her seat beside yours.

“Well look who’s back from the dead!” Sam shouted. You looked down at your watch.

“It’s literally six in the morning, Sam.” You said.

“Semantics.”

You huffed and rolled your eyes at the man, before Steve came around with all of your plates. Once he’d passed out everyone’s breakfast, he leaned against the counter with a cup of coffee.

“You really are a child, aren’t you?” You asked.

He put a hand to his chest.

“You cut me deep, cutting me right here (y/n).” Sam said, clutching at his chest in mock pain.

Bucky groaned and smacked him behind his head.

“Oh, you’re in for it now, Barnes.” He said while getting up to chase Bucky down the hall. You turned to Steve.

“They do know that hall is a dead end, right?”

“They’ll figure it out.” He shrugged. A minute later, you heard tumbling and grunting sounds, and knew that if you went back there you’d find two grown-ass men grappling on the floor like children.

You sighed and shook your head in exasperation, turning around to face your food. Spearing some of your eggs with a fork, you placed the portion in your mouth.

“Mm, a little lacking, Rogers.” You smirked at him.

He raised his eyebrows at you from over the rim of his coffee mug.

“You wanna try it?” 

“Actually, yeah I do. I’ll be willing to bet money that I make it better.” You said, placing another bite into your mouth.

“Alright then, I’m not one to back away from an honest challenge, you’re on. How much you wanna bet?”

“I’ll go easy on you this time and bet five bucks.”

“No no, come on. If you’re gonna challenge me, put some real stakes on it.”

You looked over at Wanda, who was smirking up at you from her plate. She’d already had your cooking, so she knew you’d win in a heartbeat. You looked back at Steve.

“Alright. Twenty bucks says I can make a better breakfast than you tomorrow morning.” You crossed your arms, staring him down.

“You’re on, (y/n).” He stuck his hand out, and you shook it before going back to your breakfast.

“So, heard you’re starting your first day of training today.” He said after taking a sip of his drink.

You nodded and swallowed the food in your mouth before answering.

“Yup, Nat and Wanda are gonna help me brush up on a few things.” You said.

“Well, good luck. There’s a very good reason people dread training with her, she doesn’t hold back at all. Not even when she has to train the new recruits.” He said.

You finished your plate and wiped your mouth, looking up at him with a smirk.

“Good thing, cause I don’t hold back either.” 

You stood and placed your plate in the sink to be washed later. 

“You ready, Wanda?” You asked the teen, who was still sitting at the island.

She nodded, and you gestured for her to follow you.

You think you heard Steve say ‘good luck’ under his breath as you left, but you couldn’t be sure.

Once the elevator doors opened on the training room floor, you walked out with Wanda and she led you to where Natasha was standing. 

She was in the middle of one of the many blue sparring mats, stretching. Currently, she was bent over and touching her toes, and you leaned over to Wanda.

“Close your eyes.” You told her. She looked at you funny, but you just gestured for her to do it. She rolled her eyes, but did as you asked, placing her hands over them.

As quietly as you could manage, you came up behind Natasha, and pinched her ass.

She yelped and jumped up from her bent over position, whirling around to face your shit-eating grin. 

When she saw that it was you, she scowled at you playfully.

“How in the hell did I not hear you coming?” She asked, lightly punching your arm.

“Maybe I make you soft.” You wiggled your eyebrows at her, and she rolled her eyes. 

You turned around to Wanda again.

“You can uncover your eyes now.”

She did and walked over to meet you guys excitedly.

“Are you ready for training?” Wanda asked with a big smile.

Natasha looked at you with a glint in her eyes, and for some reason it briefly frightened you.

“Yeah (y/n)? Are you ready?” She asked, a sardonic tone to her voice.

The way she was looking at you now told you that you were in for it. You suddenly regretted having teased her. 

“Yeah, I’m good. I got this.” You said.

Natasha smirked and got into place on the mat.

“Let’s get started.” She smiled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m thinking that this is probably gonna be one of the longer fics that I write, so stay tuned


	22. Training

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey so idk what happened but halfway through this chapter it stopped spacing out my paragraphs and I can’t get it to work right, just read it to the best of your ability and the next chapter will be better. Sorry

You grunted as Natasha once again knocked you on your ass. You’d been going at it for five rounds already, and you’d managed to hold your own pretty well for a good portion of the sparring session, but she’d still find some opening to pin you. 

With another small grunt, you stood up to face her again.

“You sure your ass can handle any more beatings, (y/n)?” Natasha asked. You glared at her.

“Hush.” You readied your stance again.

“I thought you were a marine, aren’t they supposed to be tough?” 

“I thought you were a spy, aren’t they supposed to be quiet?” You smirked.

“Only on a mission, angel.” 

You circled each other once more, but this time you waited on her to make the first move.

When she finally saw that you weren’t making a move until she did, she took the bait and threw a practiced fist at you. 

You ducked and rolled to the side, kicking a foot out to the back of her right leg, sending her down on one knee. She twisted and swept her left leg across the ground and you jumped over it.

You backed up while she stood, still keeping your arms up.

She threw another fist in your direction, and you caught it and pulled her forward, knocking her off-balance.

Once she’d faced you again she lunged and threw a series of hits at both your face and your abdomen, you just barely managed to block them and get a couple in yourself.

Then, like the heavens opening up from the sky, you saw an opening.

She threw one more hit from her right side, you caught it, twisted, and used her weight against her to throw her over your shoulder and pin her to the ground.

She groaned as her back slammed into the mat, and you stood up from her.

Holding your fists up high in victory, you panted.

“Whoo! Yes! That’s how we do it in the marines! Ha ha!” You fist pumped the air and bounced on your feet, giddy with excitement.

Natasha chuckled at you from her place on the floor, sitting up and turning to face you.

“Whatever, you know it’s like five to one, right?” She asked with an eyebrow raised.

“Doesn’t matter, Romanoff! I still beat you! I can die in peace.” You picked up Wanda from where she’d been standing and watching you guys, and twirled her around.

She squealed in surprise and giggled at your behavior, before you set her down. Grabbing her face, you placed a huge kiss right on her forehead.

She giggled at you, and playfully shoved you away.

You let out a sigh in relief at having finally won, and went over to Natasha to help her off the ground.

“Alright, honey, I’m done gloating now.” You said with a cheeky smile as she took your outstretched hand.

You pulled her up so you were standing chest-to-chest. You heard her breath hitch at the closeness, and you smirked.

You took full advantage of the proximity and pulled her into a heated kiss. 

You moved your lips expertly against hers, and she reciprocated in kind. You swiped your tongue against her bottom lip, asking for permission, and she got the hint and opened her mouth for you.

Sliding your tongues against each other’s and mapping out the lay of the land, you groaned at the contact.

You heard another groan of disgust behind her, and remembered that Wanda was still there.

You pulled away gently to look at Natasha, and realized that her face was flushed, and her pupils were dilated. You imagined you probably looked the same. 

“I should get you riled up more often.” She said breathily. You smirked, and leaned in close to her ear.

“Honey, if I’m that riled up all the time, you’ll never be able to get out of bed.” You felt her shiver at the implications behind your words.

You pulled away with a shit-eating grin, and lightly smacked her on her butt before walking away to join Wanda. 

Even though you pretended that you were fine, you’d be lying if you said that the sexual tension wasn’t getting to you. But then you remembered what Natasha had said about never having had sex, and you got a little anxious. 

What if she wanted you to be her first? That was a huge amount of pressure on you. What if she didn’t like it, or what if she decided that she wanted someone else for that?

You were getting ahead of yourself, there was no guarantee that she was even ready for that yet. You should probably talk to her about it though, so you could both be on the sane page when the time came. For now though, back to training. Everything else would come after. You looked at Wanda who had her back turned to you guys. “We’re done now.” You called, and she turned back around. When she saw that you two were actually separated for the time being, her usual smile brightened on her face again. “Thank God, that was gross.” She giggled. “Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you wanna train me or not?” You teased. She nodded enthusiastically and led you to the middle of the room. “Okay, so the main thing you have to watch for with any superpower is your limit of control. Figure out how much you’re able to do.” She said. “Okay, how do I know if I can control it or not?” You asked. “You have to try and use your powers. Try and produce a small fireball in your hands.” She directed. You raised your hands, and opened your palms. Focusing on the heat you’d felt before, you tried to bring it forth. Nothing happened. You focused harder, but still no fire, not even a spark. “Try and focus on how you felt the first time you used them, bring that feeling back.” Wanda said. You closed your eyes and let all background noise fade away. You remembered what you’d felt the first time you’d really used them, when that woman had told you that she was responsible for your mother’s death. The same white-hot anger bubbled within you, but this time you had a hold on it. You brought it to the forefront of your mind, and focused. You felt heat spreading throughout your body, and focused on pushing it into your hand. Slowly, but surely, the heat made its way out from your chest, down your arms, and into your hands. You opened your eyes to glance at your hands, and smiled triumphantly. Sitting in the middle of both your palms, were two, red-hot balls of flame. Wanda cheered. “That’s great, you’re doing well! Now, try to fire one.” You closed one of your fists, and tried to push the heat harshly away from you. You pictured it flying across the room and hitting the wall, burning brightly the whole time. You thrust your fist forward and a huge ball of heat flew across the training room. You laughed lightly in amazement. “Gotta admit, that’s fucking awesome.” You said. Wanda directed you to do it again, but this time with a target. She placed one of the training dummies a few yards away from you and had you try and hit it. It took you a couple of times to get your aiming down but you finally managed to blast it square in the chest. You pumped your fist in the air and whooped. Natasha and Wanda both giggled at you. You went on like that for a while, hitting different targets that Natasha and Wanda would set up all across the training room. You stood in the same spot, trying to hit every one of them from all different angles and distances. You did pretty good, it was almost like firing a gun, once you had the aiming down everything was a piece of pie. You ended up hitting about twenty-seven out of the thirty targets they gave you, and by then you were exhausted. You definitely weren’t used to how much your powers drained you yet. But Wanda assured you that it would get easier the more you used and practiced with them. You also figured out that you could do smaller things with your ‘pyrokinesis’, as Wanda had called it. Apparently you could also raise your core body temperature to innumerable heights without actually being on fire. You had made Wanda and Natasha sweat profusely by doing that. You were also temperature resistant, Wanda had made up an ice bath and told you to submerge yourself in it, and when you did, you had expected to feel at least something. All that ended up happening was the ice bath melted, and you were left sitting in a tub of water. You hadn’t felt cold at all, even though they said that even when the ice was melted, the water was still freezing to them. When you felt like you could pass out from the drain of energy your powers had on you, Natasha said that it was a good time to stop for the day. You thanked Wanda for the training session, and she nodded and told you you’d done very well for someone so new to their abilities. She offered to continue your training the next day, and you agreed. She hugged you, and then left the training room. That left you and Natasha alone. “Hey, you did really good today.” She complimented you, sitting down on the bench you were at. “Thanks. Good thing I have a great teacher.” You smirked. “Damn right.” “Oh, I was talking about Wanda.” You smirked. She punched your arm lightly. You both chuckled. When it settled into silence again, you worked up the courage to ask her what you’d been thinking about. “Hey, Nat?” “Yeah?” “Do you ever think about where we might be going? Our relationship?” You asked. “It’s crossed my mind once or twice, why?” “Well, I was thinking about what you’d said, when you were helping me pack.” “You’re gonna have to refresh my memory.” “You know, when you told me that you’d never had sex before.” “Oh. Why were you thinking about that?” She asked. “I don’t know, it just had me wondering. Like I know there’s a pretty strong connection here, and I absolutely wanna keep going with this, but I guess I’m just worried.” You bit your lip in thought. “Why would you be worried?” “Well, I mean... ugh. Why is this so hard?” She chuckled at you. “Just take your time, think about what you want to say.” She told you gently. You thought for a moment, then sighed, deciding to just come out with it. “What if our relationship gets really good, and we get to the point where you say that you’re ready for sex?” “That’s what’s bothering you?” “Yes! Being someone’s first is a huge deal! What if you decide that you don’t like it, and I was the first and only experience that you had? I’d feel awful, I really want it to be good for you if and when you decide you’re ready.” “Aw, it’s so sweet that you care enough about me to worry about that. But I know that when I am ready, you’ll be amazing. I have no doubt in my mind.” “Really?” “Come on, it’s like you don’t remember all of the other girls you’ve pleasured before me.” “Yeah, but the difference is that I’m really starting to care a lot about you.” “I care about you a lot, too. You don’t have to worry, we can help each other figure it out when the time comes, okay?” “Yeah. Plus, you still need to take me out on that date you promised me.” You smirked. “How about we go tonight? I’ve got this great pizza place in the city that I want to show you. I usually go by myself, but it’d be nice to go with a date.” “That sounds great. What time did you wanna go?” “Sometime around six, maybe? Give us a couple of hours to rest and get ready.” She suggested. “Sounds awesome, sunshine.” You smiled and gave her a quick peck on her lips, standing up to go to your floor. “Now, I don’t know about you, but I’m tired. I need a nap before that date.” You said while stretching. She chuckled and got up to stand with you. She followed you to the elevator and up to the residential floor of the compound. The whole way there you were nervous. Which was incredibly unusual for you, you were usually so suave and cool when it came to girls. A lot of times there were no feelings involved so the interactions were always predictable. With Natasha, you were beginning to feel something for her. That made this whole thing much harder to predict, and you had no clue what was going to happen next. But, you think that that might not actually be so bad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry about the spacing issues!😬😬


	23. Girlfriend?

When you woke up from your nap you looked over at your clock to check the time. It was four in the afternoon, which left you with at least two hours to get ready for your date.

You got up from your bed and stretched out your sore muscles. Standing up, you went to take a quick shower, scrubbing yourself clean. 

When you were done you dried off your hair and combed some of it onto one side in a swoop-over. You didn’t own any make-up, usually you preferred the natural look, so you kept your face the same as always.

Clad in only a towel, you went over to your closet, perusing your limited options. You really needed to go shopping for more clothes, all you had were very simple outfits. 

You finally found something that would be suitable. You picked out a black, spaghetti strap tank top, dark jeans, and some boots and pulled on the ensemble. Pairing that with your form-fitting leather jacket, you had to admit that even though it was simple, you looked good.

The material hugged your curves in all the right places, and you felt comfortable in it.

You checked the time once more, and found that it was five forty-five. That left you with fifteen minutes until Natasha would be picking you up.

You sat on your bed and scrolled through your phone while you waited.

Soon enough, you heard a knock on your door. Six o’ clock on the dot. 

Smiling, you stood and walked over to your door and opened it. The sight before you had your heart stuttering in your chest.

Natasha was wearing a black, knee-length dress paired with a jean jacket and flats. 

You honestly think she’s never looked more beautiful, although you think that pretty much any time you see her.

Hot damn she was gorgeous. Her hair was lightly curled and she had minimal make-up, light foundation and red, matte lipstick.

It wasn’t anything flashy, but it was so pretty on her. You don’t remember a time when your heart had made this much of a racket in your chest before, and then to top it all off, she smiled.

Your heart just, fucking stopped. You weren’t even sure if you were still breathing at this point, she had effectively stolen your breath away.

“God, you’re beautiful.” You told her, looking at her with nothing but sincerity.

She blushed and smiled even wider, and your heart decided to just start doing somersaults. 

“You aren’t too bad yourself.” She replied.

She held out her hand for you to take, and you entwined your fingers with hers.

She pulled you along with her until you were out of the compound, stopping by a car that was parked out in front.

She held your door open for you, and you thanked her as you sat down and buckled your seatbelt. 

She got in and did the same, then you were off.

You drove together in comfortable silence, just holding her hand and enjoying the ride. 

After a few minutes of weaving through the expanse of the big city, she pulled up to a small restaurant that only had a big LED sign in the shape of a slice of pizza on it. 

She looked especially excited as she ushered you to hurry out of the car. You chuckled at her behavior and followed her as she tugged on your hand to lead you inside.

As soon as you passed the threshold, the smell of pizza washed over you. Cheese, tomatoes, basil, meat. All of these scents mixed together in the air to bring your mouth into an instant water. 

The inside itself was quite lovely too, red brick walls, hardwood floors, black ceiling. Coupled with quaint lighting fixtures and pictures of the Italian countryside, the whole setup made for a very homey atmosphere.

A waiter came up to Natasha and hugged her, they chatted back and forth in a different language that you didn’t know, before the waiter turned to you.

“Who is this, Natalia?” He asked.

“This is my... friend. We’re here on our second date together.” She replied.

“Ah, Natalia! You cannot fool me! You do not date friends, you date girls! And I must say, this one is very pretty.” The man said excitedly, and you chuckled at his demeanor.

“Oh, where are my manners? My name is Martin, and yours?” He asked, holding out his hand for you to shake. You shook his hand and introduced yourself.

“Hi, my name is (y/n). It’s nice to meet you.”

“And so polite, strong grip too. I like you already.” He said.

“(Y/n), Martin is the owner of this restaurant, I’ve been coming here for years.” Natasha explained.

“Yes, but you do not usually bring pretty girls with you, it has been some time since I saw you with a date.” He said.

Natasha was blushing, and you just kept chuckling at the exchange. You could tell they had been friends for a long time.

He gestured for you to follow him, and he led you both to a table and set out some menus for you.

He left with a smile and went into the kitchen.

You skimmed over the menu, looking at all of the different types of pizzas and calzones they offered.

“See anything you like?” Natasha asked. You looked up at her with a raised eyebrow.

“It’s pizza. I like it all.” You retorted. She let out a bark of laughter that attracted the attention of some of the other patrons.

“Okay, well how about I pick something, and we’ll share it?”

You closed your menu and pushed it to the side, leaning on your elbows at the table.

“Sounds great, gorgeous. I trust your judgement.” You said to her.

“Great. How about the meat lovers?” She asked.

“It’s like you read my mind.” 

She giggled and closed her menu too, now that you both knew what you were getting. She kept her hands in her lap and leaned forward a bit.

“So, if I’m correct, it’s customary on a date to tell each other about your lives.” She said with a smirk.

You huffed in laughter.

“You would be correct. What do you want to know? I’m an open book.” You told her. She thought for a moment before answering.

“Hm. What’s your favorite kind of movie?” 

“Well as you know, I told you that I don’t watch a lot of movies. But I guess if I had to pick from my limited experience I’d say horror movies.” You said.

“Alright, I can definitely work with that.” She said. 

“What about you?” You asked.

“Mm... I really like the classics, mostly nerdy stuff.”

“Like what?”

“Star Wars, The Goonies, Beetlejuice, stuff like that.”

“Have absolutely no clue what any of those are.” You said. Her mouth fell open in shock.

“You poor, uncultured baby. On our next date we’re having a movie marathon, this is madness.” She said in a serious tone. You chuckled.

“Whatever you want, sweetheart.”

You both sat there looking at each other for a minute, memorizing each feature of the other’s face. Before she spoke again.

“Have you thought about if we should label this yet?” She asked, picking at her napkin.

“Yeah, I wanted to wait until you brought it up though.”

“Why?”

“Because I find myself caring about you a lot lately, and I wanted to be absolutely positive that you were comfortable first.”

“Oh. So, what would you think about a label?”

“If that label is ‘girlfriend’, I’m so okay with that. If it’s ‘friend’, I’m okay with that, too. Whatever you’re comfortable with.” You assured her.

“I kind of want it to be ‘girlfriend’.” She said, looking up at you from her napkin.

“That’s amazing.” You smiled.

“You want that too?” 

“Of course I do, Nat. How could I not? You’re amazing.”

“But, aren’t you worried that it might be too soon?”

You reached across the table to take her hand in yours.

“Natasha, what would you like?” You asked, looking her in the eye.

“I want you to be my girlfriend.” She said honestly.

“Then I guess we’re official.” You said.

She smiled and leaned across the table to place a sweet kiss on your lips, it wasn’t heated or needy, but it was soft. Perfect.

You pulled apart and stared into the other’s eyes for a long while until Martin came back over to take your orders.

It didn’t matter what happened for the rest of the night, because all you cared about was the beautiful woman sitting across from you.


	24. Tension

It’s been a month since that second date that you gained a girlfriend, a month since you both became official, and you honestly couldn’t be happier.

Things were lightening up between you and your dad, you spent a lot of time with him whenever he was in his shop repairing his suits. You even helped him out from time to time when he was tinkering on whatever new gadgets he’d decided to build. 

Your relationship with the team as a whole had grown stronger too, you helped Clint and Sam play pranks on the ‘grandpas’ a few times. You couldn’t help but laugh when you saw Steve’s face after you had painted his shield in a rainbow, or Bucky when you spray painted his clothes chrome to match his arm(you’d spent hours trying to help him wash all of that paint out).

Clint taught you how to get around the compound in the vents, and which spaces were the best for personal hiding places, if you ever needed alone time. 

You, Rhodey, Steve, Sam, and Bucky had all bonded over your military experiences, telling various war and battle stories. You all made fun of Sam cause he’d only been a detective, but he still joined in on the fun.

You had also continued your training with Wanda, and within the month, you had gained much better control and endurance over your powers. You could hit any target she pointed to, and you could do it without straining yourself so hard now. The flames came to you so much easier now.

As for yourself and Natasha, you’d gone on a lot more dates after the second one.

She’d shown you all kinds of movies, and you found out that you liked pretty much all of the stuff she did. You had shown her stuff that you liked to do also, like rock climbing, parkour, meditating. These were various things that you had taken up after the marines, and coincidentally, they were how she’d found out that you had ADHD.

You found that the more you did with her, the more that you started to feel about her. 

The attraction between you two had only grown since you became official, and you found yourself beginning to think about her all the time now.

She was the first thing you thought about in the morning, and the last thing you thought about when you went to sleep. She took up a lot of your thoughts in between there, too. 

You thought about her eyes, her hair, her smile. How she could be this ball-busting beauty one minute, then a shy, cute little bean the next. She was an enigma to you, and sometimes she was the only thing worth thinking about.

The more time spent with her, the more attraction. The more attraction, the more you thought about her. The more you thought about her, the more you started to think about... other things.

Somewhere around the first week after your second date, you found yourself picturing the both of you in less than appropriate situations. Your imagination only grew from there.

At first it was just what it might be like to wake up in bed with her, now it was what it might be like if she was under you. 

Your fantasies expanded in detail. You would picture her on your bed, under you, thrusting your fingers or a strap-on in and out of her. Watching her moan and whine and call out your name as she fell apart under your ministrations.

You would picture what it might be like to have her return the favor. How her tongue or her fingers would feel as they stretched you, how loud you might be as she brought you to the edge.

Or what it might be like to get a little rough. Pushing her up against a wall or a door and taking her fast and hard, bringing her to the edge only to pull back at the last second. Watching her whine and beg for release, the filthy things you would whisper in her ear.

These thoughts crept up on you at the most inopportune times. Currently, they were coming to you in the form of a very vivid dream.

She was on top of you in this one, her hands roaming all over your body, squeezing when she reached your breasts. You moaned, and kissed the expanse of her neck. 

She had a thigh wedged in between your legs, pressing up against your sex, and you ground down on it in a hazed frenzy. 

Just as you were about to fall over the edge, she pulled her leg back, and you moaned in disappointment. She chuckled in your ear, and you shivered at how sexy the sound was.

Her hand trailed down your body, coming to rest at the apex of your thighs. She stroked her fingers along the length of your sex, gathering up your wetness before slipping one finger deep inside of you.

You groaned in pleasure as she slid home, bucking your hips up to meet her thrusts. 

She added another finger, then another, dragging them in and out harshly. She found that spongy part inside you that made you see stars, and you let out a high-pitched wail. 

She kept thrusting, your moans getting filthier, your bucking hips becoming more erratic.

Just as you reached your peak, you gasped and sat up in bed. 

You could feel the tingle still between your thighs as you woke up more, and realized that you had actually come in your sleep. 

The slick was a little uncomfortable on your thighs, and you groaned as you leaned over the edge of the bed to look at your clock. It was two in the morning.

“Fuck, I need a cold shower.” You sighed, standing up from your bed.

You went into your bathroom and stripped yourself of your now-sweaty clothes.

Stepping into the shower, you turned the faucet to its coldest setting, letting the supposedly freezing water hit your back. Because of your temperature resistance, you hadn’t the slightest clue if it was actually cold or not, it just felt like water to you. 

You had steam coming off your back from how hot your skin was, your powers also raised your body temperature to a lot higher than a normal human. Normal body temperature for them was 98.6 degrees, yours reached 110.

After sitting in the shower for a while, you decided that it just wasn’t going to work for you. You had to do something else to release this pent-up heat in your body.

Redressing, you made your way out of your bedroom and down to the training rooms. You’d just have to punch it out.

As you were beating your frustrations into a punching bag, you noticed someone walk in. You ignored them, continuing to beat the ever loving shit out of the bag.

“Woah, what did that poor bag ever do to you?” 

You turned and saw Steve coming up behind you. You chuckled and turned to face him, panting heavily from the exertion.

“Just some extra things on my mind tonight.”

“Nightmares?” He asked.

“No, no, nothing like that. But it is a certain kind of dream that’s keeping me up.” You raised an eyebrow at him, hoping that he’d get it and you wouldn’t have to explain. 

“What about?” He asked. 

“Well, about me. And Natasha. And our bed.”

“Why your bed?” 

“You know, thoughts about what we might do, in the bed...” You trailed off.

“I don’t understand.” He said with furrowed brows. You sighed.

“Jesus, Steve. Sex! I’ve been thinking about having sex with her!” You said bluntly, exasperated at the clueless man.

“Oh! Um, sorry.” He blushed, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Seriously man, I love you to death, but you gotta learn how to pick up on references.” You chuckled. He laughed with you.

“Yeah, again, sorry. Uh, have you talked to Nat? About the uh, dreams?” He asked.

“No. And I won’t, not until she does. I want to be 100 percent sure she’s ready, I don’t want her to say she’s ready just because of me.”

“Why do you think she’d do that?”

“Well, I mean, if I tell her that I’m ready to take this next step, I’m worried that she might feel pressured. If she’s not ready, I don’t want to tell her that I am, cause she might get worried that she’s not moving fast enough or whatever and she’ll say she’s ready even though she’s not. So, I just, I really want to wait for her. I want our first time to be great, for me AND for her.”

“Well, that’s very selfless of you. I’m proud of you, (y/n), not a lot of people would be willing to think of their partner first.”

“Yeah, I just want to be good for her. Sometimes I’m so worried that I have no fucking clue what I’m doing. I’ve never really been in a serious relationship before, and I really don’t wanna screw this one up. I really, really like her, Steve.” You sighed.

He clapped a comforting hand on your shoulder.

“Hey, I happen to know for a fact that she really likes you too. I’ve never seen her this happy before, and I’m glad that you’re the reason she is. When it’s time, I know that you’ll both get through it. But you should at least talk to her, she needs to know where you stand.” 

“But I feel like I’d be pressuring her.” 

“No one can pressure Natasha into anything she doesn’t want to do, trust me. That girl is one of the most stubborn women I’ve ever met, but she’s also one of the most understanding. You can talk to her about this, I’m sure she probably feels the same way.” He reassured you.

“You think?”

“I do. Talk with her, let her know where you stand, but also let her know that you’re alright with waiting. If she’s ready too, great. If she’s not, that’s great, too. At least you’ll know where you both stand.”

“Thanks, Steve. You’re a good friend.” 

“Anytime.”

He smiled fondly at you and pulled you into a hug. 

When you both pulled away, you felt a new sort of resolve. You would talk to her, and you would tell her how you felt. If she isn’t ready, then you’ll make sure that she knows that you are more than okay with waiting. Hell, you’d wait forever for her, you were sure of it.

After all, she’s your girlfriend, and she was more than worth the wait.


	25. “The Talk”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick poll!!!
> 
> What is our superhero name?!?!
> 
> Send ideas in the comments and I’ll choose the one that I like best🥰🥰

After your talk with Steve you started to notice this weird feeling settling in the pit of your stomach like a rock. You couldn’t stop fidgeting with your hands and fingers, cracking and wringing them constantly.

You tried to remember what that feeling was called, you hadn’t felt it in so long. 

Nervous. That’s what it was. You were nervous. Because today was the day that you’d tell Natasha that you were ready to take the next step.

You really don’t know why you felt this way, after Steve had talked to you you’d gone back to your room but couldn’t fall asleep. You had just laid there for an hour. But you needed to push through it. You had to tell her now, or you were certain you’d lose your nerve. 

You jogged hurriedly to her bedroom and knocked on her door in quick, sharp raps.

The door opened and Natasha stepped into her doorframe, rubbing her eyes blearily.

“As much as I’m very happy to see my girlfriend, do you have any idea what time it is?” She asked, her voice laced with tiredness.

“Yeah, sorry, I just really needed to talk to you.” You said nervously, wringing your hands back and forth.

Natasha noticed the seriousness behind your tone and was instantly awake. She saw you wringing your hands and took them gently into her own, pulling you into her room and closing the door behind you.

“What is it, angel?” She asked.

You loved it when she called you that, in that tone, in that cadence. Like you meant the moon and the stars to her.

“I just, I really needed... Steve told me to tell you how I felt. Where I’m at in this relationship.” You told her.

“Oh. Okay.” She got a dejected look in her eyes for a moment, and you quickly reassured her.

“No! No! It’s nothing bad I promise! I just, I needed to tell you... t-to let you know that... that I’m, fuck why is this so hard?” You asked no one in particular. She laughed.

“Don’t hurt yourself. Just breathe, and talk to me. You know you can tell me anything.” She said, squeezing your hands in hers gently.

You sighed, “I’m ready to take our relationship to the next level. The ‘bedroom’ level.” You put emphasis on the word to signal your meaning. 

“Oh.” She said simply, raising her eyebrows in slight surprise.

“It’s completely okay if you’re not ready yet! I’m so not trying to pressure you into anything at all, I’d never do that to you. I need you to know that. And if you aren’t ready I won’t ever bring it up again until you do, I wouldn’t want to make you-”

“I’m ready, too.” She interrupted your nervous rambling. 

“Are you absolutely sure? I don’t want you to say it just because I did, I want your complete honesty and consent.” 

“No, I’m really ready. I have been for the last few days, I just didn’t really know how to bring it up.” 

“Really?” You asked quietly.

“Yes. I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life.” She said, leaning in to meet your lips in a soft kiss.

You moved your lips against each other’s, the kiss started off gentle, but began to get more heated. 

You stopped her, gently pulling back from her.

“Believe me, I want this so much, I really, really do. But I wanna do this right. So, Friday night, at seven o’ clock, I’m taking you out on a date.” You told her.

“Never knew you were one to woo a girl, (y/n).” She smirked.

“Yeah well, you’re worth it.” You stared at her with nothing but... love. That was the only way you could describe the feeling that you felt right now.

She looked at you the exact same way.

“I love you.” She said in a voice that was a little more than a whisper, but you heard it.

She reached out to wipe her thumb across your cheek, and it was only then that you realized that a stray tear had fallen from your eye.

“You don’t have to say it ba-”

“Shut up.” You surged forward and kissed her again, silencing whatever she was about to say next.

When you pulled away the second time, she kept her eyes closed.

“What was that for?” She asked, opening her eyes again with a soft smile.

You smiled back with new tears in your eyes, a few falling down your cheeks as you smiled back.

“I love you, too.” You whispered reverently. 

Her eyes shined with what you were sure were her own tears and she didn’t say anything else, just met your lips in a third, and probably the most passionate, kiss. You thanked your lucky stars for every second you got to spend with this beautiful woman in front of you. You thanked anybody who was out there listening that you got to spend every day with the one woman who had managed to break down your walls, and get you to love again. Lastly, you thanked Natasha Romanoff for letting you love her, and for loving you back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comment down below what reader’s hero name is!
> 
> Reminder: our powers are accelerated healing and pyrokinesis(control over fire)


	26. First Time For Everything

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have heard your cries! And I swear, there will be smut in the next chapter!
> 
> Also, our character’s hero name is Phoenix, thank you all for your suggestions🥰

Friday rolled around faster than you had ever imagined. You had spent a long time planning this date, ever since your first date with her. You had wanted to be extra prepared if the whole ‘ready for sex’ part of your relationship ever came up.

You talked with your dad about it right after you and Natasha had said your first ‘I love you’s. He helped you polish all the plans, the timing, and he insisted on finding the entire trip. You, of course, left out the part about how after this date you and her would be having sex, only telling him that this date needed to be special.

He was completely on board with everything, and had spent hours planning everything out with you. When you were sure that it was perfect, you thanked him and gave him a hug so big that you almost toppled him over.

Now, three days after the first I love you, it was Friday. This was it, today was the day. God, you don’t think you’ve ever been so nervous but also so excited for anything in your entire life. 

You made sure to tell her to wear something that was comfortable to her, and then you got ready yourself. It was currently an hour until you would be picking her up. 

You got a quick shower first, drying your hair quickly and combing it out. Then, you did hygiene care.

First, you made sure that your nails were clipped and clean, then, you shaved everywhere. Your underarms, your legs, and in between them. You had already done this the day before, but you went ahead and did it again because you knew that that was usually one of the main things to look out for during someone’s first time. 

After you were sure that everything checked out in that area, you moved on. You dressed in a simple white v-neck shirt, light blue skinny jeans, and a pair of tennis shoes. Pulling your hair back into a high ponytail, you looked yourself over in the mirror. 

You looked good. I mean you looked like you did everyday, but considering where you’d be going today it was a great outfit.

You knew that for this date you didn’t want to try and woo her by doing a ton of flashy, high-end shit. She had told you before that she hated that anyway, and you had agreed.

So, for this date, you took it down a different route that was perfect for both of you. She had been asking you non-stop for the past three days for hints on where you would be going and what you would be doing, but you kept your mouth zipped every time it came up. 

“It’s a surprise, baby.” Was all you’d say.

She would then dramatically flop her head down into your lap if you were sitting or on top of your chest if you were laying down. 

“I hate surprises.” She’d say with a sigh. You would just chuckle at her.

“No, you don’t.”

“Yes I do.”

“Nope.”

“Shut up, (y/n).” You’d laughed.

You smiled at the memory, going over everything you were going to do one last time in your head before you went to get her.

When she opened her door, you didn’t even bother to look at her outfit. Because as soon as she smiled at you, that was the only thing you could see.

Her face lit up and shined like opalescent lilies glittering in the sun, her eyes the most beautiful shade of viridian and emerald, her lips a gorgeous hue of ruby red from her lipstick. You saw her lips moving, but you couldn’t bring yourself out of the trance she had you in.

You saw a hand waving in your face, and only then did you realize she was trying to get your attention. You shook your head to clear it, and looked at her.

“What?” You asked dumbly.

She giggled. “I said, ‘are you ready?’”

“Yeah. God, you’re so beautiful, I could spend hours just looking at your eyes.” You said. She blushed.

“Didn’t know you were such a romantic.” She teased.

“Only for you.”

She only smiled and leaned in. Meeting her half way, you joined your lips together in the sweetest of kisses. When your lips parted, you simply rested your forehead against hers, wrapping your arms around her waist. Hers went around your neck and for a few short moments, that was the only thing in your universe.

“Jesus, could you two be any more gross?” 

Natasha turned her head away from you to find who it was that had spoken.

“Shut the hell up, Wilson.” She glared.

“I’m just saying, y’all never heard of the rule ‘no PDA in the halls’?” He smirked.

“Better watch yourself, you’re my training partner tomorrow.” She threatened.

You assume Sam left after that, but you had no clue. The only thing you had been focusing on was her. She turned back toward you and saw how you were looking at her.

“What?” She asked with laughter in her voice.

“I love you.” You said in way of answering.

She smiled and wrapped her arms tighter around you, tucking her head in the crook of your neck as she hugged you.

You rested your chin on the top of her head and closed your eyes, enjoying the feeling of having her in your arms.

“I love you, too.” She said.

After a few minutes of just being with her, you reluctantly pulled away and led her out of the compound and to your car. 

You drove for a while, until you got to the first place on your list. Stepping out of the car, you went over to Natasha’s side and held her door open for her.

When she got out, her eyes lit up like a Christmas tree.

“You’re taking me to laser tag?” She asked.

“Yes I am.” You smirked.

“You know I’m going to kick your ass, right?”

You barked out a laugh. “Sure, sweetheart, whatever you say.”

You walked in and used the card that your dad had given you.

“Two adults for an hour, please.” You said to the guy at the front desk. He rang you up, the pointed you over to the wall where the different sized vests were.

As you were securing yours to your chest, you looked over at Natasha. She was focused on trying to get one of the straps fastened in the back, her brow furrowed in concentration.

You chuckled and went back to securing your own vest.

When you had everything in place, you checked on Natasha, who was still stuck on the back strap.

“Babe, do you need me to help you?” You asked with a smirk.

She let her arms flop uselessly to her sides and literally pouted at you.

“Please?” She asked cutely.

You chuckled and went around to fasten the back of her vest.

“Aren’t you supposed to be like this badass assassin? But a belt stumps you?” You teased as you came back to face her. She frowned at you.

“You know, you tease me an awful lot. What are you gonna do when one day I get the upper hand?” 

“If you can find something that you can tease me for, then I’ll let you have the upper hand. But I warn you, there’s not a lot about me that’s worthy of it.” You told her.

“I’ll find something, I am a spy after all.”

“A spy who couldn’t figure out a belt.” 

She smacked your arm playfully and you both laughed.

The guy at the front turned your attention to him after you had both gotten your vests on, and started to lay out the rules.

After he was done, he opened up a locker that had been against the wall next to the vests and pulled out two of the laser guns you were going to use. Handing one to each of you, he opened the door to the course.

“Alright, one of you go in first for a one minute head start. We’ll send the second in after.” He said.

You looked to Natasha, who was bouncing in excitement.

“You go first.” You said. She looked at you in question, and you nodded. She didn’t need to be told twice, dashing into the course immediately.

The guy started the timer, then glanced up at you.

“Girlfriend?” He asked.

“Yeah.” You said.

“Y’all on a date?” He asked.

“Mmhm.”

“I took my girlfriend to laser tag once, before I worked here. You want me to give you a tip?” 

“Sure.”

“Take the first two lefts, then take the second right. There’s some built in steps where you can make an aerial attack.” He winked.

“Thanks, man. I’ll definitely keep that in mind.” You replied with a thankful nod.

Once he told you that your minute was up, you went inside and followed his instructions, slipping back into your training and keeping your gun focused and your wits about you.

As soon as you found the steps and made sure that Natasha wasn’t already there, you climbed up and waited on her.

Soon though, you heard her voice calling out to you.

“(Y/n)... you know I’ll find you.” She said in a sing-song tone.

You knew from her voice that she was only a few feet from where you were perched.

“Come out, come out.” You heard her getting even closer and you quieted your breathing, keeping the gun trained on the two paths that led to your corner.

Then, you saw her. She came around the left pathway with her gun trained on her shoulder, searching for you. Even though the lights were dimmed and blue, you could see her clearly.

You waited for the perfect moment, until she was right under you.

Then you aimed the laser at her sensor on her vest and fired. 

The red lights on her vest started blinking, indicating that she was killed. You jumped down and landed right in front of her, raising your gun up to rest on your shoulder in a hunter’s pose. 

“Baby, don’t try to beat a marine. You’ll never win.” You smirked at her, and she looked at you, shocked.

“I cannot believe you killed me.”

“Sweetheart, that’s the whole point of the game, it’s not my fault that I just play it better than you.” 

Her eyes narrowed, and she raised her own gun up to your chest, firing. Your lights also started blinking. You had your mouth open in shock as you stared up at her.

“Wh- you can’t shoot me! You’re dead, I killed you!” You said.

“Too late, I already did.”

“That is not how this game works, cheater.”

“Aw, you want me to kiss it better?”

“As a matter of fact, yes I do.” You shot back. 

Then she crashed her lips into yours, your mouths tangling in a heated kiss.

You moved your arms to wrap around her neck as you deepened the kiss. When she moved her arms to your waist, she brushed your ribs and you gave a little jerk in response.

Pulling back from the kiss, she smirked at you.

“What was that?” She asked.

“Nothing.”

“Not nothing, you jerked.”

“No, I didn’t.”

She brushed your ribs again and your body gave the same reaction, but you jumped away from her before she could keep doing it. 

As you backed away from her, she kept coming toward you with a shit-eating grin.

You held up your hands in a placating motion.

“Nat, baby, let’s be reasonable.” You said.

“I don’t know, (y/n). You’re acting very secretive, and I need to know why.”

“Hey, I’m taking you out on a date, and I let you shoot me with the laser, that’s gotta account for something.”

“Now, (y/n), you know as well as I do that for a relationship to work there can’t be any secrets.”

“Natty, please, I love you, don’t do this.” You we’re both smiling, and she was still slowly advancing on you until you found your back hitting a wall in the maze.

The second of hesitation gave her enough of a window to pounce on you. She grappled with you for a minute before she had your arms pinned above you with one hand, her other trailing dangerously close to your ribs.

“Natasha, sweetheart, wait. Don’t do it, don’t you dare.” 

She only smirked, resting her hand right on your waist as you squirmed beneath her.

“Beg me.” She said. There were times you wished that you had a filter, because you knew that your smart-mouth was going to get you in trouble one day. Today just so happened to be that day.

“Sweetheart, I don’t beg anybody for anything.” You snarked, and her eyes took on a dangerous glint.

“Wrong answer.”

Before you could stop her, she dug her fingers into your ribs, and you let out a very girly squeal. 

As her fingers danced along your sides, you grew weaker from the assault, and she was able to use both hands to attack you now.

You giggled uncontrollably, and you never giggled. It just wasn’t a sound you made. But apparently, being tickled was your weakness.

“Aw, you sound so cute when you giggle like this.” She cooed at you, continuing her tickling.

“N-nat, stop, please! I can’t t-take it, ah!” You yelped as she hit a very sensitive spot right under your arms.

“Oh alright, I guess I can take pity on you just this once.” She smirked, stopping her assault.

You panted as she finally stopped, giving little chuckles as the feeling wore off.

You stared at her, and found her looking back at you with an almost hungry look. You sobered immediately, and stared back with the same feeling.

Heat burrowed its way into your lower abdomen, and you subtly squeezed your thighs together at how hot she looked on top of you.

Though you’d never admit it, you had secretly always wanted to try being the one on the bottom for once. Every girl that you had ever been with had always expected you to be the top, the rough one, the muscle. 

Before you let that thought drag on any further, you remembered you still had to take her on the rest of the date. Clearing your throat, you spoke.

“We should continue our date. I’ve got two more things planned out.” 

“Do I get a hint?” She asked.

“I already told you, it’s a surprise. I’m not giving anything away.” You smirked at her responding frown.

Grabbing her hand, you tugged her along to take her to the next destination.

“Come on, baby. I promise you’ll love it.” 

“As long as I’m with you, it doesn’t matter.” She said. You smiled.

As you both got into your car, she turned to you.

“Did you make any plans that have to be done today?” She asked.

Raising an eyebrow at her, you answered. “No, I mean I’d like to do them today, but nothing’s been set in stone.”

“Okay. How would you feel then, about heading straight home right now?” She looked nervous as she asked it.

“Oh! You want to go back, to do that, now?” You asked with your eyebrows raised.

“It’s okay if you don’t want to. And don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love that you wanted to take me out on a date first, it makes me feel loved. But I just, I really do think that I’m ready, right now.” She said.

“Hey, you don’t have to explain. Today is all about you, and if you want to go home, then that is exactly what we’ll do. Besides, technically I did still take you out on a date.” You chuckled, trying to lighten her nerves a bit. 

It worked, as she smiled back at you and reached over the console to clutch your hand tightly. You did the same and rubbed your thumb back and forth over the back of her hand comfortingly.

You both didn’t say anything else, and you started your truck to begin the trip back home. You clutched her hand gently in yours the whole way home.


	27. Euphoria

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Smut in this chapter, if you don’t like don’t read

When you both got home and entered the compound, you noticed that it was very quiet, much quieter than is usual. Natasha noticed it too and turned to you.

“Something’s off.” She said. You smirked.

“No babe, this was all me. I had Dad clean out the compound for the next few hours so we could be completely alone. No distractions, no need to worry about anybody coming in by accident.” You said.

She smiled at you. “You really thought of everything, didn’t you?”

“I’ve been planning this for a while, sweetheart. I take these matters very seriously.” You told her.

She leaned up to give you a chaste peck on the lips.

Then you weaved your arm around hers and led her into the elevator.

You noticed that she was clutching your arm very tightly, and you knew immediately that she was nervous. Rather than asking if she was nervous and stating the obvious, you just wrapped a comforting arm around her and held her.

She gave you a grateful smile and relaxed in your hold hugging her arms around your waist.

When the elevator doors opened to your floor, you stepped out slowly and looked up.

“FRIDAY, is everything I asked for taken care of?”

“Yes ma’am. This floor is off limits for the next three hours and your room has been soundproofed and the lights are dimmed.” The AI replied.

“You did all of that, for me?” Natasha asked, disbelieving. You looked back at her.

“Of course I did, I love you. And your first time deserves the utmost care and planning, you deserve to have a good experience.” You said while gently turning her chin up to look at you fully.

She said nothing else, but you could see her eyes were shining.

You smiled at her with all the love you could put into one look and gently took her to where both of your rooms were.

“Now, the choice is up to you. I had both of our rooms soundproofed, and both of our lights dimmed. Where would you like to go?” You asked.

“Can we go to your room?” She asked in a small voice. And you nearly cooed at her, but you complied with her request and led her into your room.

You closed the door and locked it behind you, turning back to Natasha who hadn’t stopped clutching your arm once.

“Baby, what’s wrong?” You asked gently.

“Nothing. Everything is perfect, I just can’t believe that I found someone like you who’s willing to take care of me like this.” She said, letting go of your arm to hold your waist instead. 

You wrapped your arms around her as well, and the two of you swayed back and forth for a moment. You set your head on her shoulder, and she tucked hers into your neck.

You let her relax fully for just a moment, letting her take all of the time she needed to get her bearings. You kept your promise, and you weren’t going to rush a single thing tonight. You’d let her go at her own pace.

She began to kiss the side of your neck, moving up until she reached your lips. You kissed her back reverently, letting it continue at whatever speed she wanted.

Her hands started to wander, and she gently started to move backward. Her knees hit the side of your bed and she fell onto it, pulling you down with her. 

You managed to catch yourself on your elbows on either side of her head, and she kept kissing you. It started to get more heated, and she slid a thigh up in between your legs.

You groaned as her thigh touched where you were aching for her. She began to try and remove your shirt, and you let her, sitting up to take it off fully and throw it who-cares-where across the room.

At the new show of skin, she got way more handsy. She roamed over your abs, your back, then back around to squeeze your bra-clad breasts. You moaned, pulling away from the kiss so you could breathe.

“Christ, Nat, are you sure you’ve never done this before?” You asked with a smile, she chuckled.

“I take it I’m doing good?”

“Better.”

You leaned back down to continue the kiss, and her hands found their way to the button of your jeans. She pulled them open and pushed them down your legs as far as she could from her position.

You kicked the offending item off of you and it fell to the floor. Continuing the heated make-out session, you almost didn’t notice as her hands began to trail their way down to your underwear.

You pulled back from the kiss, panting already. 

“Baby, baby, wait up just a second.”

“Did I do something wrong?” She asked. You quickly reassured her.

“No! No, sweetheart. I promise you are doing all of the right things right now.” You said.

“Then, what is it?”

“Well, you’re trying to get me naked, and you’re still fully clothed, doll.”

“Oh.” She said in a small voice.

“Would you mind if I took some of your clothes off?” 

She nodded her head for you to continue, and you gently took off her shirt, revealing the expanse of her abdomen. 

Trailing kisses and your hands down until you reached her jeans, you gently unbuttoned them, pulling them slowly down her legs as they fell to the floor along with yours.

You trailed more kisses back up her body, stopping when you reached the top of her thigh.

You looked up at her for permission, and she nodded again. You hooked your fingers into the band of her underwear, gently pulling them off.

You climbed back on top of her to continue kissing her, but she flipped your positions. Now that she was the one on top, she smirked at you, and you smiled widely back at her.

She leaned down to connect your lips with hers and she took one of your hands in hers. She pushed your hand gently all the way down until your fingers were brushing the apex of her thighs.

She let out a little whine at the feeling, starting to grind her hips minutely.

You pulled away from the kiss to look her in the eyes, she nodded. 

“It’s okay.” She whispered.

You started slow, slipping your middle finger in between her folds to rub her clit in circles. 

She moaned at the feeling, and you swear you almost came right then and there from the sound alone.

When her hips started to grind down harder, you could feel that she was wet enough, and you slowly slipped the tip of your finger inside her.

“You want me to keep going?” You asked. She nodded.

“Yes, please.”

You slowly slid your entire finger in up to the knuckle, sliding it in and out of her at a slow pace.

Her hips ground down hard on your finger, and she was moaning.

“Faster.” Was all she could get out. You complied.

Slowly building up your speed, you watched her reactions. Your finger was pumping into her very fast now, and she was moaning and humping along with it.

“More fingers.” She gasped.

You added another next to the first, keeping up your speed. 

You could already feel her walls clenching around your fingers, and you went a little deeper inside her, finding that spongy part that damn near had her screaming.

You thrusted again and again, brushing against her g-spot relentlessly as she tensed up. 

Her entire body was tightly wound as her walls clamped down hard on your fingers. She let loose a long, loud moan, her hips slightly jerking with the force of her orgasm.

When she finally came down, she laid her body across yours. You kept your fingers dragging in and out of her very gently, working her through the aftershocks.

When you could feel that she had stopped jerking, you pulled your fingers out of her and wrapped your arms around her warm body on top of you.

You simply laid there with her for a few minutes, enjoying the after glow.

Until you felt three fingers enter you. You hadn’t even noticed her hand move, you were too caught up in just hugging her to you.

You moaned in surprise at the sudden onslaught of pleasure.

“Jesus, fuck, Nat!” 

“Are you alright?” She looked worried.

“God, nnn- yes. Yeah, I’m good. Was not expecting that, though.” 

“Good. Can I keep going? I want to pleasure you like you did me.” 

“Sweetheart, you can do whatever you want, do you want me to help you?” 

“No, I’ve done this enough times to myself that I know what I’m supposed to do. I just really wanna make you feel good.”

“Alright baby, if you’re sure.”

In lieu of an answer, she twisted her fingers inside you, which had your back arching.

“Oh, fuck! I’ll t-take that as a yes.” You moaned as her thrusts got harder and faster.

You didn’t think there was any other girl you had been with who had made you feel this good. 

Her fingers dragged inside of you and hit places that almost had you screaming.

She kept up her fast and hard pace, and you noticed your body starting to clamp up. 

Were you seriously about to cum this soon? No girl had ever been able to do it this fast, but Natasha was hitting all of the right places inside your walls and you felt your entire being tense up with the approach of the oncoming orgasm.

“Oh fuck, fuck Nat! Yes, baby keep going, just like that!” You praised her, and she slid her fingers across your g-spot.

“Yes! Yes, right there, right there! Fuck, do that again.” You moaned. 

She kept dragging her fingers along your spot, and you could feel your orgasm coming fast.

“Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck! Nat, baby I’m gonna cum, I’m g-”

You couldn’t get anything else out, because your entire body tensed and your back arched with the force of your orgasm.

You came harder than you ever had before, moaning loudly and humping your hips to prolong it.

When your body finally came down from the high, you fell back onto the bed panting. She pulled out her fingers and you have a little whimper at the sensation.

She curled into your side, and it took you a moment to figure out that you were both still wearing underwear.

You wanted to feel all of her skin on yours.

“Hey, take off the rest of your clothes, I wanna feel you against me.” You said, and she complied, throwing her bra off to the side.

You did the best you could with how good you still felt from the mind-blowing orgasm, but you managed to pull off your underwear and bra.

You pulled back the covers and got in, opening your arms for Natasha to climb in.

She did get in, but she pulled your body to lay on top of hers, your head resting on her chest as she made herself the big spoon.

You didn’t mind in the slightest. You lay there with her, feeling content and happy before remembering something.

“How was your first time?” You asked from your place.

“It was amazing, (y/n). Thank you.”

“You don’t have to thank me for loving you, I’ll always do that. I’m glad it was good for you.”

“How was I?” She asked.

“Sweetheart, you were more than amazing. No one has ever made me come that hard or that fast before.”

“Really?”

“I would never lie to you.” You looked her in the eye, and leaned down to kiss her. 

When you pulled back, you smiled and laid your head back on top of her chest, letting her heartbeat calm you further.

This moment would be etched in your mind forever. It was soft, it was sweet, and it was perfect.


	28. The Morning After

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (e/c)=eye color
> 
> Just a short little something something until I can figure out who the big bad for this story is.
> 
> Also I didn’t just wanna leave you guys with an author’s note

When you woke you noticed a pair of eyes on you. Beautiful emerald green stared into your own (e/c). You smiled and closed your eyes again.

“That’s pretty creepy, you know.” You said in a sleepy voice, still smiling.

“I really could not care less.” She said.

You chuckled and opened your eyes again, propping yourself up on your elbow beside her.

Running your fingers through her hair, you cupped the side of her face and gazed at her with star struck eyes.

“How was last night? Are you okay?” You asked, tilting your head toward her to give her your full attention.

“Yes, I’m good. More than good, I’m amazing. You definitely didn’t disappoint. How was it for you?”

“Sweetheart, I have literally never come so hard or so fast in my entire life. You, were amazing. You are amazing.” You told her with reverence.

“Good, I’m glad. So, not bad for a first timer, huh?” She smirked.

You rolled your eyes playfully. “Oh dear, I’ve given you an ego. I may have to pull back a bit.” You teased.

“Ha! Please, as if you could resist me.” She gestured down her body. You laughed.

“I don’t know baby, if that ego gets too big for your britches I might have to.”

“(Y/n), do you really wanna challenge me? I do know your weakness.” She smirked.

You furrowed your brows in thought, what did she know?

“What do you mean?” You asked.

“You don’t remember?” She raised her brows.

“No?”

“Oh, I am taking full advantage of this moment.” 

She straddled your hips and looked down at you with a dangerous expression. It was then that you realized that her knees were pinning your arms to your sides.

You suddenly remembered the weakness she was talking about as your eyes widened.

“Nat, wait! I was totally joking! Have mercy!”

She pretended to think as she tilted her head back and forth.

“Hmmm... alright. I won’t expose your weakness this time.” 

You sighed a little in relief.

“But, you have to do something for me.” She smirked, leaning her head down close to yours.

You raised an eyebrow. “What might that be?” 

“Kiss me like you mean it.” 

“I could do that all fucking day.” 

You lifted your head up from the bed and met her lips in a heated lock.

In this moment, naked and tangled in the sheets, warm from the lingering afterglow of amazing sex, everything was perfect.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you guys have any suggestions I would love to hear them in the comments🥰
> 
> Honestly though I love that you guys like the story and it means so much that y’all say such sweet things, so thank you from the bottom of my heart


	29. First Mission

After another hour of you and Natasha just lazing around in your bed, FRIDAY called you both to the mission debriefing room. Said that Fury was there with an important mission and it was urgent.

Natasha looked almost worried, and you assumed that it wasn’t usually urgent when they were called.

She suited up into a black, leather body suit with blue trim. It fit her body well, and clung tightly to all of her curves in just the right way. You eyed her up and down hungrily, and immediately a new flood of wetness went straight to your thighs.

She caught you looking at her and smirked. “Penny for your thoughts?”

“Oh, nothing. Just that I am definitely gay.” You bit your lip. She let loose a full bellied laugh.

“Was there ever any doubts with that?” She asked, still chuckling.

“Well if there were before, there aren’t any now.” You smirked.

She shook her head and rolled her eyes good-naturedly at you.

You had dressed in your usual look, and then you both headed down to the room that FRIDAY told you to go to.

When you opened the door you noticed that all of the Avengers, save your father, were there.

“Where’s my dad?” You asked as you went over to an empty seat beside Sam.

“You clearly haven’t met Tony before. Dude never shows up to anything early.” Clint says from across you.

“Well he can catch up when he gets here. Rogers, I assume you’ll fill him in?” Fury asked in a no nonsense tone. 

“Yes, sir.” Steve answered.

“Good, then let’s begin. A couple of days ago we received a transmission from a secured, encrypted channel in Russian. When translated, we found that it was from Hydra.” Fury explained.

“What did they say?” Steve asked.

“The usual. ‘We have the ultimate power, you cannot defeat us, cut off one head...’ yada yada yada. But, they also made a demand.”

“Let me guess, they want us to stand down, or else!” Sam said in a mocking tone.

“Usually, Wilson, you would be correct. But not this time. No, the demand this time was that SHIELD hands over the one who goes by (y/n) Stark.”

All eyes in the room turned to you. They looked like they wanted answers, but you were just as confused as them.

“Why did they want (y/n)? Did they say?” Clint asked.

“No. Just demanded that we turn her over, and gave us a time and coordinates on where to meet them. We checked the coordinates, and it seems that they want to meet in a secluded forest clearing miles away from any civilization.”

“Why a clearing?”

“I’m guessing so that they’ll have clear shots if it turns into a fight, which most likely, it will.” Steve answered Clint’s question.

“Well they can fight all they want, no one is taking my daughter away from me.”

You looked behind you and saw your dad at the door, looking uncharacteristically furious. You guessed he probably caught the tail end of the conversation.

“Stark, so glad you could finally join us.” Fury snarked.

“Yeah, anybody wanna catch me up? Maybe tell me what the plan is?” He asked with a wave of his hand at Fury’s comment.

“Hydra sent a cryptic message saying that they want us to hand over (y/n), and we’re all confused as to why.” Steve answered.

“Rogers is right. But I assume that it might have something to do with the woman that kidnapped her. These agents are most likely affiliated with the woman and are angry that she killed their leader.” Fury said.

“But why only contact us a month later? Why not before?” Natasha asked.

“My best guess would be that they were most likely trying to rebuild their numbers before they amassed an attack. We killed most of that particular branch off, so it makes sense that they would need time to gather up more recruits to rebuild.”

“So, how are we going to take them down?” Bucky asked.

“We go to the location at the time they want us to meet. We say that we’ll give her up, and we make it look like she’ll go quietly. The Avengers are all that they’ll be expecting, so when a shit-ton of SHIELD agents appear and surround them, we take the upper hand and gun ‘em down.” 

“Isn’t that a little risky? We don’t even really know what they want with her, and we’re just gonna gun them down?” Bucky asked.

“Yeah, that seems way too easy. We still don’t know where their main operations are, if they have more people, if their goals are bigger than we know.” Wanda said, you figured she would know better than anybody, having once believed in Hydra.

“Well then somebody give me suggestions. Because we tried to ping their location by tracking the radio signal they sent the transmission with, and it took us to the middle of the ocean. We don’t know where this base is, or how to find it. We know it must be somewhere in Russia, because of the language and accents, and I don’t know if you’ve kept up with current events, but Russia is fucking big. I do not have the time or the resources to search an entire country for a secret organization, so please, somebody give me a better idea.” Fury said, and the whole room fell silent for a few moments, before you got an idea.

It was the stupidest idea you’d ever had, but it could work, it was possible. That was enough for you.

“Let them take me.” You said.

All eyes flew to you.

“What?”

“Are you insane?”

“No fucking way!”

“After what happened last time?”

“Are you serious?!”

A plethora of both worried and shocked complaints assaulted your ears, and you waited for them to quiet down.

“(Y/n), you have to be joking. Do you honestly think we’d do that after we almost lost you last time? How do you even think that would work?” Clint asked.

“Well, they obviously want me. So hand me over. You could plant a tracker into my shoe or somewhere they’d never think to look, and when I get to the base they take me to you can bust the party and come in guns blazing.”

“How do you know they won’t already be expecting something like a tracker?” Steve asked.

“You plant other decoys. Like give me an earpiece or a different tracker that’s easy to find on me. That way when they likely destroy those, they won’t expect the real one, and their guard is let down.” You explained. 

You had personal experience with extractions, sometimes as a marine, you and your team were called on to take pretty serious cases almost like this one.

Fury looked almost impressed with you, though you couldn’t quite tell through his cool mask he kept firmly in place.

“Is no one going to talk about how crazy this is?” Your dad spoke up. 

“Tony, I hate to say it, really I do. But the girl is making a pretty good point. This could be our only way to figure out what they plan on doing with her.” Sam said in a calm voice, trying to placate Tony.

“Yeah, and plus, we’d be right behind her if things get hairy.” Steve reassures.

“Tony, man, you know you’re one of my best friends, and you know that we ALL care for (y/n), we wouldn’t let anything happen to her.” Rhodey says.

“I can’t believe this. You’re all going along with this? Natasha, come on, you’re her girlfriend, please talk some sense to me.” Tony said, clearly getting very agitated.

Natasha stayed silent for a second, then looked you in the eye from beside you. 

She saw the determinant look in your eye, and the experience of having done this before. She trusted you, and knew that what you were saying was their best shot. She turned back to Tony with a resolute look.

“I’m sorry, Tony. As much as I absolutely hate the idea of her going in alone, she’s right. This is our best bet, and I trust my team. I trust her.” She said, and you reached over to take her hand. She squeezed it back.

“Wanda? You two are like sisters, surely you must not be okay with this?” He asked her in a last ditch attempt.

“Of course I’m not okay with it.” She said.

“Finally!” Your father exclaimed.

“But, I know that this is also our best shot. So while I’m not okay with it, I have to deal with it because it’s all we’ve got.” She continued.

Your father slumped in his chair with his head in his hands.

You reached across the table to lay a comforting hand on his arm.

“Dad? I’ll be okay, I’ve done things like this before, and I’m confident that it’ll work.” You said.

He looked up at you, and for once you couldn’t read the look on someone’s face. His features were unreadable.

“I’m sorry, (y/n). But I will never be okay with this. You’re my daughter, and while you’ve done this before, I haven’t. No matter what you tell me, I will never be okay with this idea. I almost lost you once, and I refuse to lose you again. I won’t stand by and just watch you hand yourself over. So, Fury, you can count me out.” He scraped his chair back, and stormed out of the room.

The whole team just sat there in shock, not knowing what to do. After a few moments of tense silence so thick you could cut through it, you stood up from the table. You knew what you needed to do now.

“Fury, May I be excused for a moment, sir?” You asked.

“You may... agent.” He said as an afterthought. 

You didn’t have time to ponder on what that meant. Right now, you needed to beat some sense into a stubborn asshole.


	30. Stubborn Ass

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so real quick search up ‘red super suit’ and look for the man that’s wearing a red and black suit. That is the reader’s new suit, I can’t figure out how to copy/paste links on my phone... so yeah.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry for like, the days of no updates. I’ve been busy with school and got so stressed out about an essay that I literally started crying, I’m good now I promise🥰 and I promise I will finish this fic😁

You were livid as you stormed down the hall in the general direction of your father. When you were too frustrated to even think, you just asked FRIDAY where he was.

“Miss (y/n), Mr. Stark has asked me to not allow anybody his location.” The AI responded.

“FRIDAY, normally I would be nice, but I’m pissed off right now. Tell me where he is or I’m tearing the compound apart to look for him.”

“Yes miss.” The AI responded.

When you finally found him, hiding away in the office you’d first met him in, you banged open the door.

“What the hell, dad?” You were almost shouting. 

“Please, come right in.” He snarked.

“This is so not the time for your shit, right now. Answer my question.”

“I don’t know what you want me to tell you.” 

“How about why you’re hiding away in here like a coward?”

“You know why. I made it perfectly clear.”

“Look, I get it, okay? You’re scared. Well, guess what? So am I. But I’m not going to let that get in the way of what I know needs to be done.” You sighed.

“(Y/n). I cannot just sit by while you literally hand yourself over to the enemy without doing a single thing about it.”

You scoffed. “You can’t sit by? What exactly are you calling this then?” You waved your hand over where he was sitting at his desk.

“Fine. I can’t watch you do it, whatever. That’s not the point. You’re my daughter, (y/n), and I just got you back. I absolutely refuse to lose you, especially since I’ve spent my whole life trying to keep you safe.” He stood up and leaned his hands on his desk.

“I’ve been doing this my entire life. I’ve gone on hundreds of missions like this before, I know what I’m doing, I can keep myself safe.”

“I know. That should comfort me, but it doesn’t. I’m just, I already didn’t protect you when you got stabbed, and then you were kidnapped. Both times I didn’t know whether or not you’d survive or if you would live through it, all because I failed to protect you.”

“Look, I get that. I really do. But you have to know that I don’t blame you for any of that, and you shouldn’t either. None of it was your fault.” You said, more calm now.

“It just bothers me that after I promised that I’d take care of you, I have to sit by while you hand yourself over, and I’ll be powerless to stop anything that may happen to you before I can save you.”

“I’ll be as careful as I can, and I have the world’s greatest heroes beside me. Plus a Dad made of iron, so I think I’ll be okay.” You smirked.

He huffed out a laugh despite his previous disposition, and looked up at you.

“Technically it’s a titanium alloy, but whatever.” He replied.

“Yeah, but ‘Titanium Alloy Man’ just doesn’t have the same ring to it.” 

He laughed fully now, and you joined him. After you both calmed, you nudged him. When he looked at you, you opened your arms.

“Would a hug make you feel any better?” You smiled cheekily.

He came over and wrapped you up in the hugest, strongest hug you’d ever had.

You both swayed back and forth minutely, embracing each other and just being in the moment for as long as the world allowed it to last.

You got where he was coming from, you really did. Honestly, you were scared too. Every single time you went on one of these missions it scared the hell out of you.

These types of missions were the most delicate, and required a very smart and well thought-out plan. If even one thing went wrong, it could mean the difference between life or death.

Before though, you had never been worried about these types of missions. Scared sure, who wouldn’t be? But you weren’t ever worried because you knew that you would get it done, and even if you didn’t it’s not like there was anybody waiting for you at home anyway.

Now it was different, everything had changed.

Now, you were scared AND worried. Worried because you did have people waiting on you at home. Worried, because if you died there would be a lot of devastated people crying over you. 

You had built a family with the Avengers, and now because of that it made this mission that much harder.

At the same time though, now that you had this family, it made it even more worth it to make sure that you came home.

Your short reverie was interrupted by a clearing of a throat sounding behind you.

You pulled away from your father and turned to meet the person, it was Steve.

“You guys okay?” He asked.

Tony coughed and straightened his posture, trying to seem nonchalant despite the fact that he’d been close to crying only moments ago.

“Yeah, Spangles, we’re good.” He answered.

“Are you still out?” Steve asked.

“No. I’ll go on this mission, but let me make one thing clear: I am not responsible for my reactions if she gets hurt.” He stared at Steve with the utmost seriousness, clearly conveying his dislike of the situation.

“Understandable. But don’t worry, she’ll be fine. After all, she’s our Phoenix.” 

“I’m sorry, I’m your what now?” You said, utterly confused by the nickname.

“You know, a Phoenix? They’re born of fire and when the world brings them down, they just rise up again from the ashes. You’re fiery, and all of the times that life has tried to bring you down, you’ve come out stronger than before, a little messier, but still stronger.” Steve explained.

“I don’t really know about all th-” You started.

“I like it.” Your father sounded from beside you. You turned to him.

“Phoenix, it suits you.” He looked at you with a sort of sparkle in his eyes that almost looked like pride, but you couldn’t be sure.

You stared at him for a second, before chuckling and giving a shrug.

“Alright, yeah. I can dig it.” You conceded.

“Speaking of it suiting you, I have a surprise that I was saving for your next mission. Come with me.” Your father said.

You raised an eyebrow at his retreating form before Steve motioned you to follow with a knowing grin.

You brushed it off for now but went with your dad to wherever he was going.

Apparently he was taking you to his lab. When he motioned for you to stand at one of the clear spaces on a table, you did and patiently waited while he pattered around.

Eventually, he pulled a very high-tech looking glass case that looked like it had a swirling vortex of red sand in it.

It kept forming and reforming into different shapes, and you stared in awe at it.

“What is this?” You asked.

“It’s a nano-tech super suit that I developed specifically for you. It’s fire-resistant and heat-resistant, so it won’t burn you or your clothes. It’s also bulletproof, and tear-resistant, so no more getting shot or stabbed. And I colored it red and black, so it looks awesome on top of everything else.” He smirked at that last part.

“How exactly am I supposed to put it on?”

“You might want to take off your jacket first.” 

You did as he said, and set your jacket beside the box. When you’d done that, he motioned for you to give him your hand.

“I reconfigured it so that as soon as it reads your fingerprint, that’s the only thing that’ll open it from now on. Just place your thumb on that small, blue rectangle.” He directed.

You did, and immediately the glass door opened and the nano-tech latched onto your arm and swirled upward.

You gasped at the weird sensation, it almost felt like your skin was crawling, but not in a bad way. Like you were being gently submerged in water.

When you looked back down at your body not even a second later, the suit had already attached itself to you. Red and black contorted to fit your body perfectly and make moving feel effortless and unrestricted.

You looked at one of the mirrors on the wall behind your dad, and had to admit that the suit looked totally badass on you.

It was quite possibly the coolest you’d ever looked.

You twisted this way and that, trying to ogle the suit from all possible angles, marveling at the incredible fit.

“Do you like it?” Your father asked, smiling in front of you.

You looked at him, and smiled hugely.

“Oh, hell yeah. This suit is awesome, how long did it take you to make this?” You asked.

“I started on it as soon as your powers manifested for the first time. Been working on it and tinkering with it ever since. Finally finished it a couple of days ago.”

“That’s, just like, wow. Just wow. Thank you so much, I love this.” You smiled at him, and strode over for another hug.

This one lasted even longer than the first and seemed stronger than the first, too.

You were so happy that you finally had this connection with your dad that you had longed for for so long. Right then and there, you swore to yourself that you would do what ever it took to come back from this mission alive.

Failure wasn’t an option.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again I’m really sorry for the days where I didn’t update, thank you to those that are still with me it means a lot to me


	31. Tiny Problem

Oh, how you wished you’d listened to your dad. 

After your talk with him and the new suit, you’d both gone back into the room and told Fury that your dad was back in, and so was the Avengers newest hero: Phoenix.

You had been excited, almost giddy. The preparations for the mission had gone off without a hitch, and they had all of the things you needed for it in place, including the tracker and the decoy.

You were ready, or so you thought.

As soon as you had gotten to the coordinates that Hydra had sent you, the team decided that it would be better if you went alone, in order to not arouse any suspicion.

As you had expected, once Hydra had you captive, they searched you for tracking devices and earpieces. 

They found your decoy, and promptly smashed it. They didn’t find the real one hidden in your suit, but that wasn’t the problem.

No, the problem, was that as soon as you made it past the doors to the base they took you to, they set off a small EMP as a precaution. 

You could hear the small spark inside your suit as the tracker was apparently destroyed, and you just hoped that it hadn’t been destroyed before the team could get your location.

You still held out hope though, and paid careful attention to the base they were dragging you through, if it could even be called that.

It was honestly more like a small house that you were in right now, and while there were a lot of Hydra soldiers, you didn’t doubt for a second that when the team found you there wouldn’t be any trouble taking them out.

Thankfully, it didn’t look like there were any other prisoners here, but that also meant that they’re full attention would be on you.

The two men that had been dragging you through the base stopped when they came to a small cell with a chair in the middle of it. 

They brought you over to the chair and slammed you down into it before restraining your hands behind you, and your ankles to the legs of the chair.

They left and locked the door to your cell, leaving you in complete silence.

You sat there for a couple of minutes, wondering what they might have in store for you. 

You didn’t have to wait very long, as only a couple of minutes later, a man with a sneer on his face came strolling up to you.

He opened the door to your cell and walked in, locking it behind him.

He stopped in front of you, before speaking.

“Do you know why you’re here?” He asked.

“No, I mean I was taken against my will, so.” 

You weren’t prepared for the fist that came across your cheek harshly, almost knocking you over in the chair.

You reeled from the sudden flash of pain, touching your tongue to your lip to find it bleeding.

“I know your precious little team is coming to find you, but I still have plenty of time to play with you. So, how painful that time is, is up to you.” He sneered in your face.

You backed your head up away from him. You didn’t like the look he was giving you, it was like he intended on giving you pain, but he found pleasure in that thought.

He smirked evilly and stood back up, searching in the back pocket of his cargo pants. 

When he revealed what he had been looking for, your body clamped up in fear. You quickly schooled your features before he noticed though.

He was holding a large syringe of the same black substance that the crazy lady had had. 

“Judging by your reaction, I’m guessing you know what this is.” He smirked.

“Yeah, your psycho of a boss tried to use it on me.”

“Yes, well this is the same serum, only a little altered.” He said with a smile.

“What do you mean?” 

“I can’t reveal all of my secrets so soon can I? We still have a lot of fun to have before your team comes busting through.”

“Why do you seem so nonchalant about the fact that my team knows where you are?” You asked.

He chuckled darkly, and leaned down to your ear.

“Because I want them to see what happens when they cut off a head of Hydra. Eventually there must be a punishment...” He started trailing his hands up your abdomen, stopping at your clothed chest.

You grit your teeth hard as he squeezed.

“And ruffling your pretty feathers seems a fitting punishment, doesn’t it?” He whispered in a vile tone in your ear.

You whipped your head to the side where he was and clamped your teeth down on his nose.

He screamed, and you felt blood fill your mouth, but you only bit down harder.

He was pulling against you, and his continued screaming had attracted the attention of the other agents.

They quickly entered the cell, but not before he ripped himself free and you spat out the chunk of flesh you’d bitten off, blood dripping down your chin.

The two agents that had come in sprang into action, one checking on their leader and the other smacking you on the side of your head with the butt of his gun.

Your head whipped to the side, and this time the impact caused the chair to be knocked over with you in it.

You gasped as you landed rather painfully on your right shoulder, and you were almost positive it was dislocated.

The leader got up, still holding his nose in pain. You smirked as soon as his eyes met yours.

His face lit up with rage and he stomped over to you before kicking you in your ribs.

Thankfully, nothing cracked, but it still hurt like a bitch.

“Oh, I’m going to enjoy having fun with you.” He motioned to the men beside him, and they roughly yanked your chair upright again.

He punched you again as soon as they stepped away, splitting your cheek this time.

Then he yanked your hair and made you face him. 

“The next hour is going to be very painful for you, I was going to be nice and use this later, but you’ve pissed me off. Now I get to watch as you writhe in pain.” He sneered, grabbing the syringe from where he’d dropped it.

Pulling the cap off the needle, he yanked your head back again by your hair, you struggled against him, but to no avail.

He jammed the needle into your neck and pressed down on the plunger.

This time, you didn’t get the reprieve of passing out before you felt the pain.

The breath was forced completely from your lungs harshly. Your chest felt like it was caving in on itself as you desperately tried to pull in air.

Your heart had stopped, and your head started to fill with a pressure as all of the blood rushed to it from your straining.

You felt as if your chest was going to explode, or your head, or both.

You could hardly focus on anything happening around you as the pain of not being able to breathe was so great.

Your abs kept clenching painfully, trying to push air in by force as you gasped silently, your mouth opening and closing uselessly.

Finally, just as the edges of your vision had started to blacken, your lungs inflated with a huge gasp of oxygen.

You sat there, hunched over and heaving as you drew in as much air as you possibly could.

You were vaguely aware of someone laughing, and you tilted your head up to the sound with a glare.

“Well now! That was just something, wasn’t it? The look of pure terror on your face as you realized you couldn’t breathe, more priceless than any jewel.” He said almost like he was in awe.

“What the hell is wrong with you, you sick fuck?” You panted with a growl.

His face switched quickly from a look of awe, to one of rage. 

“Watch your tongue, bitch, or I’ll cut it out.”

You snapped your mouth closed, but not from fear, something else had you gritting your teeth suddenly. He laughed as he realized what it was.

“The other effects of the serum are taking effect now, I see? Yeah, you’ll wish you were dead by the time the hour’s up. I’m glad I get to see it all unfold.”

Your body was starting to convulse as a wave of blinding pain slammed into you, and in that moment you had only one thought.

‘This is going to fucking suck.’


	32. Torture

Pain. That was it. All you could see, feel, breathe, was just pain. Nothing else. Pain, pain, pain.

No human should ever have to feel like this. Ever.

You didn’t know whether at this point if you were dead or not. You didn’t really care either, you just wanted the pain to stop. 

It filled your being with a blinding speed, burning like a tub of boiling water. Stinging like a thousand cold needles stabbing into your skin.

You didn’t know if you were crying or screaming, or possibly both.

Had no clue if it had been minutes, or hours, or days, weeks, months, years.

Time was not a worry for you right at the moment, the only thing on your mind was the excruciating pain radiating throughout your body.

You almost felt like you couldn’t breathe again, but in the back of your mind you were vaguely aware of air wheezing in and out of your lungs.

You were alive, but you were exhausted. You could feel your muscles cramping and seizing in utter agony.

You had never been one to shy away from a little pain, but this was worse. You couldn’t think, couldn’t see, couldn’t do anything else but feel the fresh hell in your veins at the moment.

You really wished your dad would hurry up. You really wished you could tell the team that you were sorry. Wished you could be there for Wanda. 

You really, really wished you could kiss Natasha one more time.

For some reason, as you sat there writhing in absolute agony, you thought of your beautiful girlfriend.

How pretty she always looked when the sun would hit her face just right, how her eyes always seemed to light up whenever you were around, how her kisses could cure anything that ailed you.

Oh, how you would’ve loved to have her lips on yours again. To look in her gorgeous, emerald orbs. To hear her laugh tinkling through your ears.

You didn’t know if you were really dying or not, but if you were, the last thing you wanted to be thinking about was Natasha.

She was the only thing you wanted to see in your mind’s eye if you were to go out right now.

So, you forgot about the pain and just kept on thinking about her.

In the back of your mind, you knew that you couldn’t take much more of this. Each convulsion was getting weaker, and your breaths were getting shallower.

You knew what was probably happening. You were dying.

You were almost sure of it, you could feel the life dripping and draining out of your tired limbs like water.

But you didn’t worry for too long on that, just kept thinking about Natasha.

About how beautiful it sounded when she’d told you she loved you, how amazing your first time together had been, how you wished you could wake up next to her again and again.

Then you started thinking about Wanda, and how much you were gonna miss her training with you. How you wished you could’ve kept teasing her about her obvious crush on Vision, or given her relationship advice when the time came. Or even how you wouldn’t be there to stay up late at night with her after she had a nightmare, to hold her until she calmed, to stroke her hair softly until she fell back asleep.

You thought about the guys. How you were gonna miss meeting up with Clint in the vents after you had a particularly rough day. How you were gonna miss teasing Steve and Bucky about being the ‘grandpas’ of the group, or how you would miss Steve’s advice. How you and Sam and Rhodey would constantly rib each other during a game of pool. How you’d miss Bruce’s shyness, or when you’d visit him in the labs and say, ‘what’s up, doc?’

You thought about your dad, what this would do to him. How you’d never be able to fight by his side as ‘Phoenix’. How he’d never hug you again, or tell you he loved you, or how proud of you he was. How you wouldn’t be able to tease him about his wife, Pepper, and how mushy he’d get whenever she was mentioned.

You sat there, in the worst pain imaginable, both from the serum and the new pain starting in your heart.

You were leaving them. You were leaving your family. You were about to die and all you could think about was how much you would miss them.

Like you were just giving up. Laying down to die all while wallowing in your misery.

No. No fucking way. No way were you just going to give up and die here. Die by that pervert Hydra’s hand, while you just sat there and took it.

Fuck that, and fuck him.

You weren’t dying here without fighting a hell of a fight first. It didn’t matter if the team was coming to rescue you or not, there was no guarantee they’d make it in time. It was up to you to make sure you got out of here, that you didn’t die without a fight, that the team didn’t lose you because you gave up.

So, you clawed through your consciousness until you could see what was going on around you.

You came to again with a gasp.

The two men plus their leader were still gathered around you, laughing at your pain.

You saw one of them walk up to you and grip your chin with his sweaty hand, lifting your head up to face him.

Sneering in your face, he leaned in closer.

“Dumb bitch, we could do anything to you right now, and you’d be powerless against us. Wonder how that feels, huh? To be helpless.” 

You looked him in the eye with a sudden clarity, now free from the pain, but still exhausted, and you chuckled.

“Not as good as how I’m about to feel.” You replied, surprising him.

Then you used whatever strength you had left in you and gathered all of the heat you could possibly muster, bringing it to a centered point in your chest before shoving it outward.

You bathed the room in fire, a swirl of crimson, amber, and gold. Heating the atmosphere around you to unimaginable temperatures.

You could hear their screams as you burned the entire base to the ground.

You felt the chair and the ropes turn to ash under you and you collapsed to the ground.

Somehow, you don’t know why, but you could feel where your fire was as you were burning the base. 

You could tell exactly what you were burning, be it person or object. 

You destroyed everything you reached out to, turning everything into a charred, ashy mess.

When you knew that everyone was dead, and that the base was destroyed, you looked to the one person that you had kept alive through it all.

You had made sure that the fire didn’t ever touch him while you were destroying everything, you wanted him to see, to watch.

You stood from your collapsed place, and walked over to him. He started to back up, fear written all over his features.

“Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Aren’t you supposed to be the leader here?” You asked, smirking down at him.

“How? How did you do this?” He asked.

“Honestly, I have no fucking clue. I just wanted you to watch.” You said with a smirk.

You bent down to face him, and he flinched. 

You discreetly stole the gun attached to his hip and stood back up.

Once he noticed the weapon in your hands, he only had the chance to widen his eyes before you emptied the entire magazine into his chest.

You kept shooting, even after the mag was emptied, even after he was already dead.

When your finger had stopped involuntarily squeezing the trigger, your shaking hand dropped the offending metal.

You backed away from his lifeless body and began to make your way out of the burned base.

As soon as your feet touched the snowy powder outside, your suit’s boots crunching the snowflakes beneath you felt like a balm.

You were out, you hadn’t died. But you still didn’t feel good, you were completely drained from the impressive release of your powers, and you were so tired.

You looked up at the slowly falling snow, the light grey clouds hovering above you.

“Wow, that’s really pretty.” You said to no one in particular.

You almost remember seeing a quinjet landing beside you before your world went black and you collapsed in the snow.


	33. Alive And Well

‘She’s coding!’

‘Hurry up, get her on the table...’

‘... be okay now.’

‘I love you, (y/n).’

A swirl of voices brought you in and out of your consciousness several times before you were able to finally open your eyes and see clearly.

It took a great deal of effort, you were so fucking tired, but you finally managed to pry your eyes open and take in your new surroundings.

It looked like you were in the medbay. There was an IV and a heart monitor attached to you. 

That would’ve been fine, except the beeping from the heart monitor was starting to make your head pound.

It was nice to know that you were alive, at least, you thought you were.

You honestly couldn’t tell at this point.

You had been so sure that you were going to die. I mean, at the time it sure as hell felt like it.

But you were pretty positive that death wasn’t supposed to hurt so damn bad. So that must mean that you’re alive. Whoopty freaking doo.

Pushing yourself out of your thoughts, you assessed the extent of your injuries.

Your right arm was in a sling, so you’d been right about it being dislocated. 

Touching your cheek and your lip, you found that they were both split, and they stung a little when you touched them.

Your head was spinning like a top, and you felt a little nauseous. You assumed you most likely had a concussion.

On top of it all, you were fucking exhausted. You knew that if you even attempted to do anything more than lifting an arm, you’d absolutely pass out.

But other than that, you were just dandy.

“Miss (y/n), it is nice to see you. I have alerted the team that you are awake. They should be here any moment.” 

You jumped, the sudden appearance of the AI’s voice startling you.

Not even seconds after the AI had warned you, the entire team came bursting through the medbay doors.

You chuckled slightly at their enthusiasm.

Natasha and Tony both took each side of your bed, holding one of your hands in theirs. Wanda sat on the bed by your feet, tightly gripping your shin as if to remind herself that you were there. The rest of the team hung all around your bed, some of them looked like they had tears in their eyes.

“This is a nice welcome.” You smiled lightly.

“Jesus kid, is it good to hear you talking again.” Clint said.

“Seriously girl, you scared the shit out of us, when your tracker went offline...” Sam trailed off.

“Let’s just say that we’re very happy the mission didn’t end up in a total disaster.” Rhodey placated.

You chuckled, before turning to Natasha. Her eyes were watering, like she was dangerously close to crying.

You smiled softly at her, raising a hand up with an exhausting amount of effort, to wipe away a tear that had already fallen.

“Hey, baby, it’s okay. I’m alright.” You said softly so only she could hear.

It was like that was all she needed to break down. 

Immediately after the words left your lips, her lip started trembling, and she began to sob.

You pushed yourself into a sitting position, almost passing out from the effort, but you managed, then hugged her as tightly as your tired body could manage.

You could hear everybody else except for Tony and Wanda leaving. You pulled away from the hug, or tried to anyway.

As soon as you started to move away, Natasha let out the most pitiful whine you’d ever heard and hugged you tighter to her.

“Okay, okay, I’m not going anywhere. I’ll stay right here, okay? You’re alright, I’m right here.” You comforted your distressed girlfriend.

You took one arm off of Natasha and motioned for Tony and Wanda to join in on the hug.

You knew that out of everyone on the team, these three were probably the ones that needed this the most.

Out of the entire team, they were the ones that when you looked at them, you could tell that they had had a rough go of it. All of their eyes were bloodshot, and had dark blue bags under them from lack of sleep. You assumed you must have been out of it for quite a while.

Wanda and Tony didn’t hesitate to wrap themselves around you when you motioned to them. 

Wanda warped herself around your back and snuggled into you as far as she could manage. Tony gathered all three of you the best he could in his arms.

You tugged a little harder on Natasha and guided her to lay on the bed with yourself and Wanda, it was a tight fit, but you couldn’t care less.

As you lay back down with both of the girls wrapped around you, you looked up at where you father was sitting.

He had tears in his eyes, and the biggest smile on his face.

“What?” You asked.

He shook his head. “I’m just so glad you’re okay now. I had thought we were gonna lose you when we first brought you in.”

“Speaking of which, how long was I out for?”

“The worst week of my life.” You heard Natasha say from where her head was nestled in your chest.

You stared up at your dad in disbelief.

“Have I really been out for that long?” You whispered in shock.

He nodded silently, though you saw him swallow hard.

None of you said another word. 

It had been an apparently long week, and all they needed right now was to know that you were okay. You were alive, and you weren’t going anywhere.

Talking would come later, for right now though, you just held your girlfriend and your sister. Your father watched over all of you.

As you settled into the serenity that this one moment provided, you felt your eyes close, and your incredibly exhausted form fell into the calming waters of sleep.


	34. Serenity

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m going to end this story soon, but fear not! There will be a part two that’s mostly Nat x reader centric🥰
> 
> Happy reading!

When you woke up again, Wanda and Tony were gone, but Natasha was still in the same place she had been.

She was awake, and was looking down at you from where she had propped herself up on her elbow. She smiled upon seeing your eyes open, and you returned the favor.

“Hi.” She whispered.

“Hey.” You greeted back.

“I missed you. A lot. You have no idea how scared I was when your tracker went offline suddenly. We were only able to track you most of the way there before we went blind.” She said, her smile fading into a serious expression.

You still just smiled dopily at her, so happy that you were alive and here with her in this moment.

“You’re so beautiful.” You said dreamily.

She rolled her eyes good naturedly. “Hey, come on, I’m being serious. We should talk about what happened while you were there, when we finally found you the whole place was almost completely ash. Honestly, the only reason we even found you was because of the fire; you caused a pretty big explosion.”

“I caused an explosion?” You asked. You knew that the fire you’d made had been huge, but you didn’t think it would’ve turned into an explosion.

“Yes, it was like a bomb went off. We saw it in the distance and followed it to you. Why did you blow it up?”

“Nothing there worth saving. Did you see that their servers were still okay?”

“Yeah, we got what we could off of them, after we saved you, of course.”

“Good.”

You were both silent for a moment, and you were just enjoying the quiet moment with her before she spoke again.

“(Y/n), what happened in there? I don’t know much about fire, but I know that it can’t choose what it burns. And there were two things that weren’t burned out of everything there. The servers, and a man.”

“Yeah.”

“Why wasn’t that man burned? What made him so important?”

“Why do you assume he was important?” You defended.

“Because the servers were, and you didn’t burn them. So, there must’ve been a reason why he wasn’t burned also.”

You sighed and closed your eyes. You didn’t want to talk about that vile man. You didn’t want to tell her that you felt absolutely giddy as you filled his chest with lead. Because that part of you, the part that took pleasure in killing him, scared you. 

You didn’t want to scare her, too.

You didn’t notice that a few unwanted tears had slipped from your closed eyelids, until you felt a soft hand gently wiping them away.

“Hey, hey baby, it’s okay. You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, I wouldn’t make you. I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable, angel.”

You opened your eyes again and held her hand against your cheek, keeping it there.

She seemed hesitant for a moment, before she spoke again in a quiet voice.

“(Y/n), did he... did he hurt you?” The way she put emphasis on ‘hurt’ made you realize why she’d been nervous to ask.

“No, nothing like that. He tried, but I didn’t let him.” You reassured.

“What’d you do?”

“I bit a chunk of his nose off when he got close enough.”

She went dead silent at that, her jaw dropping in disbelief.

Then, a smile slowly spread across her face and she broke down in giggles.

You lightly chuckled along with her.

“Oh, oh my God. My girlfriend’s a badass!” She kept chuckling.

“Damn right, don’t you forget it.” 

“And a little crazy.” She smirked as her laughter calmed some.

“Hey, you gotta do what you gotta do. I wasn’t about to let him get away with touching me like that, this body is for your hands only.” You winked at her and you both started laughing again.

After you both calmed down, she sighed.

“You know, Fury’s gonna want to go over what happened on the mission in great detail.” She told you.

“I’m familiar with post-mission debriefs, Nat. But right now, I could fucking care less. I wasn’t sure I’d ever make it out of that place alive, and the only thing I thought about was getting back to you. Well, I’m back now, and you’re here with me again, so Fury can wait.” You said with complete sincerity.

“Aw, you think about me?” She smirked.

“Baby, every minute of every day. You’re always on my mind.” 

She smiled then, and leaned down to capture your lips with her own.

You sighed into the kiss, feeling unbelievably safe and at home. Natasha always seemed to have that effect on you, but you were not complaining.

When you both pulled away, you raised a tired hand and combed your fingers through her hair. She smiled as she leaned into the touch.

“Lay in bed with me?” You asked.

“I don’t know, I don’t wanna hurt you anymore than you already are.” She said anxiously.

“Please?”

“But-” 

“Shh. Lay with me.” You pleaded gently.

She rolled her eyes with a find smile before motioning to you to move over.

You scooted off to the side as much as the bed would let you, and opened the blankets for her.

She climbed in carefully next to you, and tugged the covers over herself.

Snuggling up to your body as close as she could, she laid her head on your chest and draped an arm around your middle.

You both just lay there, enjoying each other’s warm embrace.

You had never felt so lucky to be able to love the woman in your arms than you did right now. 

For this one, perfect moment, everything else in the world faded away.


	35. Debrief

When you woke up for the third time, it had only been two hours gone by, judging by the clock.

Thank God for your superhuman healing, because you already felt tons better. Looking down at the still sleeping figure on your chest, you smiled.

Natasha was unbelievably adorable when she was sleeping, and you really did not want to wake her up, but you also didn’t want to stay in this creaky hospital bed any longer.

You gently nudged her awake, and softly called out her name.

“Nat, Nat baby, come on. You gotta wake up now.” 

She groaned and buried her head deeper into your chest.

“Mmm.”

“Sweetheart, I know you’re awake.”

“...Don’t wanna.”

You nearly cooed at her sleepy voice, but kept nudging her shoulder.

“Come on, sweetheart. Wouldn’t you rather sleep in a real bed? Besides, we do have to debrief Fury at some point and I can’t do that if you’re sprawled across my body.” You coaxed her.

You scooted yourself out from under her and she whined at the loss of your heat.

“Is the Black Widow, the most terrifying and badass assassin in the world, really whining right now?” You teased, standing up from the bed and looking down at her.

Natasha cracked open an eye to glare at you, when she noticed that you were standing.

She jolted from the bed and sat up quickly.

“(Y/n)! What are you doing?! Aren’t you hurt?” She fussed, standing from the bed and coming up in front of you. She looked you over worriedly, searching for any signs of pain.

“Nat honey, super healing, remember?” You rubbed your hands up and down her arms, placating her worried nerves.

“I know, it’s just, I mean a minute ago you could barely lift your arm, and now you’re just fine? It doesn’t seem right.” She fussed.

“Babe, I promise you that I’m okay, really.” Even though you really did believe that you were fine, another small part of you was saying that even with powers it was odd that you healed this fast.

You pushed that thought out of the way for now, focusing on calming your girlfriend for now.

“Hey, Nat, look at me.” She let her worried gaze shift to your eyes.

“I’m okay. Better than okay, actually. I don’t know why, I just know that I’m fine, and I’m here now. With you.” You calmly reassured.

She sighed and melted into your arms, her own coming up to weave themselves around your neck. You hugged her back, letting the warmth the embrace brought soothe you.

After a few moments you pulled away gently, kissing her soundly on the forehead.

“Come on, we should go find Fury now.” You said quietly, she nodded.

—————

When you finally found him, he sat you both down with the rest of the team in a room with a long, rectangular table.

Taking a seat at one of the many chairs at the table, you listened in as Fury started talking.

“As you may know, the mission did not go completely as planned. But on the bright side, there were no casualties on our side and we got the information we needed. Agent (y/n), would you care to explain, in great detail, what went on when you went offline?” 

You took a deep breath, and steeled yourself.

“When they brought me into the base, they had an EMP that disabled my tracker, so that’s why I went offline. After that, two of their men escorted me into a small, dimly lit room with only a chair sitting in the middle of it; they strapped me to the chair. The two men left, but a different one came in. This, I assume, was their leader. He seemed to be the one that was calling all the shots, and he told me that he wanted to make me suffer.” You stopped to look around the room, where several of your friends had begun to clench their fists. You continued.

“He then proceeded to feel me up inappropriately, to which I responded by biting a chunk out of his nose.”

This made several of the Avengers chuckle silently, their shoulders shaking in mirth.

“Because of that, he decided that he would move on to the painful part of the torture. He hit me several times, then injected me with the black serum from before. Over the course of the next few hours, he sat and watched while I was in great pain. For a moment, I was sure I might die, but I gathered the last reserves of my strength, and blew up the base while he watched.”

You stopped for a moment while that sank in, then finished your story.

“When I was done and had made sure that the fire didn’t touch their servers, I took his gun from him and emptied it into his chest. Then I walked outside, saw the quinjet in the distance, and collapsed in exhaustion. The rest is history.” You finished.

You left out the part about how much you had enjoyed killing them. How your blood sang as you saw the life leave the leader’s eyes. They didn’t need to know, they could never know that part of you.

The room was silent for a few moments, as everybody took in all of that information. After a full minute, the director spoke up.

“Good job, agent. I, for one, am glad that that base is gone. One less Hydra facility to worry about, but I’m just sad I couldn’t see it myself. Get some rest, all of you. And Banner, when our agent has had a good night’s sleep, do a full medical evaluation, I wanna know if that serum has messed with anything we need to know about.”

“What, why? I feel fine.” You said rather defensively. The director looked at you in surprise at the outburst, before answering.

“Because, you seem fine now, but I need to make sure that that serum hasn’t done any long-term damage. Now, go get some rest, and Banner, don’t forget.” With that Fury left the room.

For some reason, that made you extremely pissed off. You were fine, you had super healing, if you weren’t fine you would be the one to know. So why was it such a big deal?

You jumped from your thoughts when Natasha touched your arm.

“Hey, you okay?” She asked.

“I’m fine, let’s go to your room tonight, okay?” You got up without hearing her answer, taking her by the hand and leading her up to the elevator.

When you reached her room, you told her to go ahead and get settled, and that you’d freshen up in the bathroom first.

When you got in, you locked the door and leaned on the sink with your head down.

Looking up into the mirror, you stared at your reflection.

Why had you gotten so angry at a simple request? You had never been a quick tempered person. If anything, you were very chill in most situations. 

So why in the hell were you so mad right now?

Shaking your head, you turned the knob on the sink and splashed your face with some cold water.

You tried hard not to think about all of the bad things that had happened recently.

You needed to escape for a day, spend time with your family. Almost dying had really put things in perspective for you.

You knew that Wanda could probably use some more time with you.

You assumed that this whole fiasco had probably hit her the hardest, losing Pietro, then almost losing you. You can’t imagine how devastated she must’ve been not knowing if you were okay or not.

You’d hang out with her tomorrow. Plan a whole day for just the two of you, to calm you both down from recent events.

Yeah, that was a good idea. Things would go back to normal and you would heal like you always did.

With a new resolve and a much better mood, you turned to open the bathroom door.

You hadn’t noticed when you walked out the black vein creeping up your neck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a warning, it’s about to get real. Mwahaha😁


	36. Build up

When you woke up the next morning at four in the morning, as per usual, you went down to the training rooms to get in some reps before 8 ‘o clock when you’d be waking Wanda up for a surprise day out.

You’d woken up because of another nightmare, the same freaking one. And you were so tired of it.

Couldn’t you just, for one fucking night, sleep in later than four in the morning?

Couldn’t your mother just leave you alone to sleep for once?

Guess not, because she was still invading your unconscious every single night.

You decided to take out your frustrations on one of the punching bags, hoping it would relieve the tense anger welling up in your body.

As you wailed on the bag, you let your mind wander.

You were so tired. You really wished that after a nightmare you could just go back to sleep like every other person. Or, better yet, that you didn’t have nightmares at all.

What you wouldn’t give for just one night of complete rest. Just one night of uninterrupted bliss.

But no.

You had been through enough in your life, hadn’t you? You’d lost your mom, never had a dad, were tortured twice, almost died multiple times, couldn’t you get at least one break?!

You stopped punching and looked down at your arm.

It had gone clean through the bag, sand pouring out from either side. 

You were breathing hard, your chest heaving with the effort. But you hardly noticed through the rage singing in your veins.

You decided that you needed a sparring partner. You really didn’t feel like punching through another bag. Looking at your watch, you saw that it was already six a.m.

You went to where you knew Steve was probably out for his run. 

You found him doing a lap around the compound and stopped in his path. He slowed up and stopped in front of you, a slight sheen of sweat covering his body as he looked at your angry face.

“You okay?” He asked.

“Fine. Need a sparring partner, you free?” 

He had barely nodded before you were pulling him along with you.

As soon as you were both on a mat you immediately started throwing hits, giving him no time to adjust or prepare for the attack.

You had him pinned in no time, and stepped back an inch to allow him to stand.

He gave you a strange look, standing back up to face you.

Again, you gave him no time to prepare as you went on the offensive in a flurry of well-placed hits and kicks. 

Knocking him on his ass again, he didn’t get up this time, only sitting up and staring at you with that same look.

“Are you sure you’re alright? You seem angry, did something happen?”

“You know, Steve, I didn’t come here to talk. I came here to spar.” You snapped.

‘What the hell was that, (y/n)?’ You thought. You took a deep breath, and tried to calm down. You spoke again in a slightly less clipped tone.

“I’m fine, just tired.”

He looked at you with sympathy, and understanding.

“Bad dreams?” He asked.

“It’s not important. Let’s just spar, please?” You deflected.

He nodded and got up again. For the rest of the morning until about 7:45, you both sparred.

When it was time to go and wake up Wanda for your day out, you bid your goodbyes to Steve and made your way up to her room.

You first changed and freshened up a little in your own room before gently opening Wanda’s door and walking up to the side of her sleeping form.

You had a smile on your face as you watched her sleep. She looked absolutely adorable.

Currently, she was tightly curled up into a ball, hugging one of her pillows to her chest.

You sat down on the edge of her bed, combing her hair back with your hand.

She stirred and smiled in her sleep.

“Wanda, Wanda honey, wake up.” You coaxed her.

She groaned, and begrudgingly opened her eyes, looking up at you with a sleepy gaze.

“(Y/n)? What are you doing?” She mumbled tiredly.

You grinned at her. “I’m taking you out today. I figured you could use some good, quality sister time. So, today is all about you and me.”

She woke up a little more at that and sat up to face you.

“Really?” She asked.

You nodded your head. “I’ve got some fun stuff planned today, just for us. So, what do you say?”

She didn’t give an answer verbally, instead choosing to launch herself into your lap in a crushing hug.

You chuckled at her enthusiasm and hugged her back. Standing up, you picked her up with you bridal style and swung her in a circle as she squealed.

Setting her back down, you lightly pushed her toward her bathroom.

“Go on and get ready, okay? I’ll be waiting for you in the kitchen.”

She rushed off to get ready and you went into the kitchen to wait on her.

—————

The first place you ended up taking her was to breakfast at one of the many diners lined up in a downtown area.

You both order a plate of waffles and syrup then sit down at a booth across from each other.

As you’re waiting for your plates to arrive, Wanda starts talking.

“So, what brought this on?” She asked.

“Brought what on?” You tilted your head to show your confusion.

“This whole ‘day out’.”

“Oh. Well, I know this mission took a pretty hard toll on you, I just figured you could use some sister time.”

“Well, thank you. And it was really hard, thinking you were gone. You know, your heart stopped on the table, I was so scared that I’d lost another sibling.”

You see her eyes starting to shine, and quickly reassure her.

“Hey, hey, none of that. I’m still here, I’m still alive, okay? I’m not going anywhere anytime soon. Let’s not think about that right now, because we are going to have fun today, alright?” You asked with a smirk.

She smiled and you reached over and wiped the single tear that had fallen from her eye.

After that the waitress brought over both of your guy’s breakfast.

After she set down your plates you both dug in and continued to talk about happier things.


	37. Boiling point

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I swear I’m alive! You can all stop worrying now ;)
> 
> So so so sorry for the whole month with no update, I’ve been really busy trying to balance work and school but I’m gonna try and update some more here and there. 
> 
> Happy reading!😁

When you and Wanda had both finished your breakfasts, you left to take her to the next location for your day out: a walk in the park.

As you were walking, Wanda started up a conversation.

“So, how are you feeling?” She asked.

“I told you already, darling, I’m feeling okay and better than ever.” You said.

“You know we still don’t know what that stuff did to you, and this time is different because I wasn’t there to take it out of you.”

“Wanda, really, I’m fine. So far there have been no ill side-effects.”

“I know, but I can’t help but worry. Maybe when we get back you should go in and check up with Bruce, just to be sure.”

“I said I’m fine!” You snapped.

Immediately she snapped her mouth closed and looked at the ground, stopping in her tracks.

Where in the hell had that come from? You had never snapped like that at Wanda before.

You sighed and stopped beside her, placing a hand on her shoulder.

She looked up at you hesitantly.

“Hey, look, I’m sorry okay? I don’t know where that came from, I didn’t mean it.”

She bit her lip, before speaking.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” She asked in a soft tone.

You looked down and sighed again, before looking back up at her.

“Honestly? I don’t know, I think I’m just tired or something, I can never seem to get a full night’s rest.” You tell her.

“How long has this been going on?”

“Since my mom died. Ever since she left I’ve had the same reoccurring nightmare that will never let me sleep past four in the morning.” 

“That’s horrible! Why have you never said anything?” She gasped.

“Didn’t want to bother anybody with petty shit.”

“(Y/n).” She said admonishingly.

“Well, you know how stubborn I am. Plus I figured you all had enough of your own shit to deal with without piling mine on.” You said.

“Next time just talk to us, I promise you we don’t mind. What happens in your nightmare?”

As you’re about to tell her, some guy walks past you and bumps into Wanda. 

And, like an asshole, he just keeps walking without even saying anything.

Your rage boils in your blood and you storm forward and grab his arm.

“Hey!” He exclaims.

“Why don’t you apologize to my sister?” You say in a clipped tone.

“Get off me you crazy bitch!” The guy tries to shake you off but you just grip his arm tighter.

“I said, apologize.” Your voice is low and menacing, the man is now trying to pry your hand off his arm with no luck.

“AH! You’re hurting me!”

You don’t say anything this time, only grit your teeth and stare him down as he desperately tries to get out of your vice-like grip.

You’re completely desensitized to the world around you as you squeeze harder and harder.

You can almost feel his arm about to give, the muscles grinding under his skin, the bone starting to bend.

“(Y/N)! Stop! You’re hurting him!” Wanda shouts in your ear.

It’s only then that you realize she had been trying the whole time to get you off of him by pulling on your shoulder. 

You snap yourself back into reality and quickly let go of the man’s arm like it had burned you.

He falls to the ground and scrambles away from you, groaning and clutching his arm as he gets up and runs away.

Wanda comes in front of you and shakes your shoulders.

“What the hell was that?!” She shouts.

You’re still dazed, and very surprised as well. 

What in the actual fuck? What was that and where in the hell did it come from? Why would you do something like that?

And possibly the scariest question, why had it felt so good? You had enjoyed every second of that, and you were confused as to how. How could you enjoy doing harm to someone, holding power over them, controlling whether their arm broke or not?

But it had. It had felt really good to finally have power over something, when for the longest time you’d had power over nothing.

You didn’t know why it felt like that, and you were scared of yourself. But also, a little piece of you in the dark reaches of your mind also didn’t care.

You realized Wanda was still trying to get your attention and you snapped yourself out of your own head.

“(Y/n)! Your eyes! What’s happened to your eyes? Can you hear me?” She asked frantically.

Your eyes? What was wrong with your eyes?

You turned your head to the building next to you and looked at your reflection in the glass window.

Your eyes were completely black with veins protruding out from the sides.

It looked truly horrifying, like something from a scary movie, but for some reason you still couldn’t bring yourself to process it.

You just stood there, staring at yourself through the glass.

Wanda was pulling you somewhere now, away from your reflection, away from those haunting eyes that you still weren’t sure were yours.

“Come on, we are taking you to Bruce right now.” She said worriedly.

You didn’t say anything back, just followed in a daze, thinking about those oily black pools stuck in your sockets.

**Author's Note:**

> I’m going to post as regularly as possible. I’m so excited about this story, one more shoutout to confusinggemini612 for this awesome idea! I hope I do it justice babe☺️☺️


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